Nightmares
by MidnightThief15
Summary: Two months after the Red Eye flight, Lisa is still haunted by nightmares of the man with eyes like ice. And then her nightmares become real. REWRITING.
1. We Meet Again

**Chapter One: We Meet Again**

"_I may just have to steal you…"_

"_I haven't been called Jack since I was ten. My last name is Rippner…"_

"_Jack the—oh…"_

"_That's what I told them…before I killed them…"_

"_Someone do that to you?"_

"_Is that what it is?"_

"_He held a knife to my throat the whole time…"_

"…_ever since I've been…trying to convince myself of one thing over and over…"_

"_That it was beyond your control…"_

"_No…that it would never happen again…"_

"_You know, I never liked you…"_

"_I think you're not such an honest person…"_

"_Right now my job is all about you…"_

"_I may just have to steal you…"_

"_We'll talk again…"_

"_Leese…"_

Lisa Reisert sat up quickly as she awoke in a cold sweat. It was one of _those_ nights again. Some nights she had a perfectly dreamless sleep while others she had nightmares of that flight two months ago. Well, actually, there were more nights where she had the nightmares than not.

At first they were all she saw when her eyes slid closed, flashes of that eventful night and morning. She would even go so far as to not sleep so that she wouldn't see them, but she would eventually collapse and after a visit to the hospital she stopped that dangerous act.

Over time they had gotten better, they wouldn't play in her head every single time she closed her eyes to sleep or even to blink, but they were still there. When she wasn't dreaming of the nightmares, she was haunted during the day by them. She kept a gun in her nightstand now, just in case for in the future. She would turn around constantly whenever she was in public or even in private, just to make sure that he wasn't lurking in some corner.

Of course he wasn't lurking in some corner. Jackson Rippner was either one of three things: in a heavily guarded hospital, in a heavily guarded prison, or dead from all the wounds he had received thanks to her and her dad.

Lisa figured that she'd be having these nightmares for some time more and would be paranoid for a couple years. That's how she had been after the…event in the parking lot that one day. It was still painful for her to recall that day. It had been even more painful for her to tell…_him_…about it. She had been a virgin.

But the nightmares and the paranoia had eventually disappeared sometime during the three years it had been. And eventually she would get over these nightmares as well. She was already on her way too, a bit faster than she had been with the previous nightmares. Maybe it was because she hadn't been violated, although sometimes looking back it certainly felt like she had.

Sometimes the nightmares now wouldn't even be the action parts, it would just be talking: him taunting her. Sometimes they would be only action: him slamming her against the bathroom walls, him knocking her unconscious with his head, her stabbing his throat, her shooting him, her desperately trying to get away, him strangling her practically to death, her stabbing him with her heels, and her standing over him as she heard the sirens coming closer. Other times it would be both action and talking, and those were the nightmares that she couldn't stand the most.

Tonight had been a light nightmare, with only talking, but it still made her skin crawl and still made her break out into a sweat when she awoke. It still made her heart thump in her chest wildly; feeling like it would beat right through the skin and onto the floor. It still made her look around her dark room, just waiting for him to pop out with that huge butcher's knife, ready to stab her to death.

But there was no insane assassin waiting in a corner of her room preparing to kill her using an overly sized knife. The large nightlight she had now made her feel a little safer. It let her see what was in her room, so that she wouldn't be panicking over nothing. She wasn't afraid of the dark, but she _was_ still afraid of that charming homicidal maniac with the amazing light blue eyes.

She realized how unlucky she was with men. Maybe it was fate that these things happened to her and would only stop once she realized that she was doomed to remain alone and afraid and paranoid forever. Nothing bad had ever happened to her when caused by a woman, except for a few of the annoying guests that have stayed in her hotel before. And sure, there are those women that make everyone else around them feel bad so that they themselves can feel better. She had been a victim to that, but really, who hadn't? She had never been threatened or cut with a knife, nor had she almost been murdered and forced to help out with a murder of an innocent man and his family by a woman.

Lisa looked at the clock. It was three a.m. exactly. She sighed, realizing that she wouldn't be able to go back to sleep now, so she got up and turned on the lights before taking a shower to rid herself of the sweat caused by her nightmare.

In the shower she just let the warm water drip down her body, erasing all her worries and pains and leaving her mind blank. She loved it in the shower, because it was like it just washed everything away. It washed her past away, who she was away, and most importantly; it washed her memories away. It helped her to not think about…_him_…and what he had done, or tried to do anyways.

As soon as Lisa stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around her, she felt the comfort and relaxation that the warm water had provided her instantly disappear.

Going back to her room, Lisa changed into a clean pair of pajamas and turned the lights on in the hallway, walking toward the living room with her towel still in hand, drying her wet hair.

She sat on the couch and curled up, turning on the TV. She let her wet hair soak the top part of the back of her shirt but didn't really care. It was just water and it would dry up and look like it was never even there.

Lisa blankly flipped through the channels, not really watching but just trying to get her mind off of things. She stopped on the History channel to see what the program was about.

"The public increasingly came to believe in a single serial killer terrorizing the residents of White chapel, nicknamed 'Jack the Ripper' after the signature on a letter received by—,"

Lisa turned the TV to the food channel, where she was sure that nothing would remind her of Jackson.

"Now, a drink that would go lovely with this would be a Sea Breeze. Or, if you're in the mood for something a bit stronger, then a Bay Breeze would work well."

Lisa flipped the channel again.

"And the winner of today's Lottery is Jackson Richards. Tell us Jackson—,"

She flipped again.

"Today the home of the Kents was burnt down to the ground from a stove left on and unattended. The only survivors were young Jackie and Lisa, also known as Leese by their close family and friends. They were left without parents this afternoon and so will be raised by their widowed grandfather."

She flipped it yet again.

"Jackson Rippner, the main man behind the plot to attempt an assassination on Senator Keefe. Luckily, his plans were thwarted by a loyal citizen who worked as a manager at the hotel Keefe was staying at during that time. The manager shall be unnamed for privacy from the publicity, requested by the manager himself or herself. Jackson Rippner was escorted from the hospital he was recovering in—from the wounds caused by the manager in a means of self-defense—earlier today into a highly secured and guarded prison. There he will serve a life sentence for his crimes."

She turned the TV off. She didn't want to hear or see anymore. Every single channel that she had flipped through had either been boring or had reminded her of _him_, literally. All the names had been close to his, heck, the first channel had even been a documentary about freaking Jack the Ripper! And on the fire one, that nickname, not to mention the names of the children, had reminded her of him. No one had ever called her Leese other than Jackson.

How ironic, really. Fate hated her, it must have. Except for the part where she stopped Jackson and saved the Keefe's, but that could have been just because of her brains and adrenaline rush, rather than fate.

Honestly, Lisa was lucky to be alive right now, and she knew it. She was lucky that she got away safely, her dad still alive and the Keefe family still alive. Everyone was alive and she was glad. After all, the situation could have turned out much differently. Her dad could have gotten shot. The Keefe family could have gotten blown up. She could have gotten butchered. Jackson could have gotten away with a fat wallet, still not caught and punished for his heinous acts. But he was now locked behind bars, and the world—and Lisa—were safe from him at least. For now, for always, at least she hoped so.

Lisa sat on the couch for a minute more, just staring off into space blankly. She then stood up and walked into the kitchen, sitting down on a stool at her island counter. She lied her arms down on the cold marble and rested the right side of her head on the top of them, slouching over.

So many times she had wished that this had never happened, that it hadn't been her that it had happened to. If her grandmother hadn't passed away at that time, then she would never have had to board that flight. She would never have met that charming stranger with the amazing eyes in the line at the airport and down at the Tex Mex. She wouldn't have learned the terrible truth that he was yet another bad man who had come to hurt her. She wouldn't have been threatened, and neither would her father, even though he wasn't aware that his life was in danger. She wouldn't have had to use a gun, to steal a car, to run a man over, resulting in his death.

Cold tears fell down her cheeks. She wished that none of that had happened. But most of all, however, she wished that nothing like that would ever happen again. She didn't know if it would, and she wasn't sure if she wanted to know.

It wasn't fair how that blue-eyed monster still gave her nightmares, still scared her to death even though she was safely locked inside her home and he was securely locked inside a heavily guarded prison. It wasn't fair how her every waking moment, and how her every dream, revolved around him and that flight. It just wasn't fair that he had become a part of her life in these past two months, a part of her life that she would give anything to get rid of. She would have given the world to forget the memories of Jackson. To never have known his face, to never have heard his voice or looked into those cold eyes, and to never have thought anything more of the name Jackson then just as a name.

Now every time she heard the name Jackson, or even something similar to it, she would go on alert. She would look around her, studying her surroundings, just waiting to find him watching her. She knew that if he ever stepped foot out of prison again, the first thing he would do would be to find her. And then he would kill her, maybe after torturing her, it would depend on how merciful he was feeling. The injuries that she had given him during their last encounter held no comfort or confidence for her. She was deadly terrified of that man, and she was sure that he knew it as well. What she had done to him were the bravest things that she had ever done.

She never wanted to be put in that position again.

Lisa looked at the clock on her microwave. Four a.m. How long had she been crying?

Taking her head off of her arms, Lisa wiped her tears away with her fingers and the backs of her hands. She lightly heard the gentle pound of a soft rain outside as it hit her closed windows, behind the black-out curtains. She didn't want anyone to be able to see in and she didn't want to be able to see out. She didn't want to know what was out there, if only to keep her safe for a little while longer than she would be if she knew.

Ignorance is bliss, after all.

Standing up, Lisa touched her hair with her hands, running them through it to feel how wet it was. It had dried up only a little bit. She sighed and pushed the stool to the island in. She wished that this was all a bad dream that she could wake up from, and that all that would linger was the fear of an imaginary man who had done bad things to her only in one single, worthless dream, and that she could easily forget him and move on with her life. Not that her life had actually been going anywhere, anyways.

She pretended not to notice how the other Lux Atlantic employees acted around her, but she couldn't fool herself into thinking that they didn't act differently. They were always so careful and cautious and nice around her, as if they were just waiting for her to break down in sobs and go on and on about all the bad stuff that had happened to her and how life was so unfair. Even Cynthia was handling more than she used to and kept on insisting that Lisa take a break or vacation and that she could handle everything just fine.

Just how weak did everyone think that she was? She had bested a trained assassin with only a few bruises and scratches leftover! How dare they think that she couldn't handle herself! Sure, granted, he was only a manager, like herself, and didn't really get his hands that dirty, and, sure, he had told her that he was a terrible shot, but still! That still counted for something! Yet everyone was acting as if she couldn't take care of herself. It infuriated and annoyed Lisa to no end. She wasn't a child, yet everyone was treating her like one ever since the Red Eye flight. Cynthia would offer to drive her home, to pick her up for work, to take her out for coffee and dinner and movies and shopping trips. What, could she not go anywhere on her own?!

Lisa knew that she should be grateful, but she wasn't, not in the least. No one was actually giving her or offering her what she really needed. She didn't want people always telling her that Jackson was locked up for life and would never step foot outside of a prison or courtroom again, or that even if he did get released that he would never come looking for her. She didn't want to hear that! What she wanted to her, what she needed to hear, was that he was dead! Only then would she finally be at ease! She wanted him good and dead and out of her life! Only then was she sure that the nightmares would stop.

However, the court had ruled that he spend a lifetime in prison for her crimes. She thought that they should have sentenced him to death. That would have been more befitting. After all, he was an assassin. He deserved to be dead. He had most likely caused countless of people to lose their lives before, yet because he was a manager and had never done the dirty work himself, the court couldn't find enough evidence to kill him. That was justice for you, unjust.

Suddenly the phone rang. Lisa froze. The noise had startled her as it pierced through the silence. She relaxed when she realized that it was just the phone and nothing major.

Walking over to the phone, she picked it up and looked at the collar I.D. It was the Lux Atlantic. Why would they be calling her so early in the morning?

"Hello, this is Lisa Reisert," she said as she held it up to her ear. Whoever it was that was calling certainly didn't care about her sleep.

"Lisa, it's Cynthia, I'm so sorry to bother you so early in the morning, but we have a serious problem down here and we need you." Cynthia said on the other end, sounding frantic. What was she doing working the night shift? Cynthia never worked the night shift. She was always either too busy having a night life or sleeping, like normal people did at this time of morning.

"Alright Cynthia, I'll be right over." Lisa reassured her before hanging up and putting the phone back down. She walked into her room and changed into some undergarments, a pair of gray, form-fitting slacks that were boot-cut near the bottom, a pink sweater, and black low-cut boots. Grabbing her keys and wallet off of the nightstand, she went into the bathroom to brush her hair and teeth and put on light make-up and then walked out of her apartment after checking herself in the mirror. She locked her door, leaving all of the lights inside of the apartment on, and walked down to her car. She unlocked that and slid in the driver's seat, putting the key into the ignition. And off she drove to the Lux Atlantic in the dark of early morning.

Lisa got there as quick as she could, which was quicker than usual because there was hardly any traffic on the road, reminding her that she should be in bed like the rest of the sensible world. But no, work always came first, _always_. No matter whom it was. She bet that work even came first with…_him_. Of course work always came first with him! In his profession, he undoubtedly ate, slept, and breathed work.

_Okay, time to get off of that topic now,_ Lisa told herself. She wasn't quite sure how the thought process had ended up with Jackson—every thought she ever had nowadays seemed to end up with him—but she needed to put an end to it before it transgressed into anything more.

She strolled into the Lux Atlantic's lobby and immediately spotted Cynthia, worriedly standing in front of the main counter. She looked around and didn't fail to notice the police officers talking amongst themselves, which got Lisa very, very worried.

"Cynthia, what's going on?" Lisa asked warily as she approached the blond.

"Oh, Lisa, thank goodness you're here." Cynthia gushed as she turned to Lisa with a frantic expression. Thank goodness? Well, Cynthia always was a bit off; at least Lisa always thought so.

"What's going on?" Lisa repeated herself as she motioned to all of the policemen about in the lobby.

"There's been a…something happened." Cynthia said worriedly. If she had not taken a pause then the sentence would have made no sense whatsoever. As it was it barely made any sense.

"I can tell," Lisa said, trying to hold onto her patience so as not to get angry at Cynthia when she was so disheveled. "Mind explaining what exactly happened?"

Cynthia looked around and then took a step closer to Lisa and whispered, "Someone's been murdered. I heard the police say that they think that Jackson Rippner might have been involved." Then Cynthia started to break down in tears while Lisa just stared at her with a blank expression, not being able to soak the information in. "Oh, Lisa, it was terrible." Cynthia cried, "I saw the body drenched in its own blood. It was horrifying! I don't know who would do such a terrible thing."

"Cynthia," Lisa said slowly, unsure if she really wanted the answer or not, "who was it that was killed?"

"George Foreman," Cynthia cried, "a wealthy businessman. He was so young too, and unmarried."

Lisa inwardly frowned at Cynthia. She wasn't crying because an innocent person was dead. She was crying because she had seen the body. She was crying because she hadn't been able to get a date with the rich, young, eligible bachelor. She was crying for her own self-pity. And she expected Lisa to comfort her with sympathy and tell her how unfair it was and that there were other rich, young, eligible bachelors out there just waiting in line for someone like Cynthia.

Lisa would not tell her that though.

"Cynthia," Lisa said slowly and calmly with what little patience she had left, it was too early in the morning for this, "why did you call me down here? Why not the owner?"

"Because," Cynthia cried, obviously disappointed that her friend was not helping her, "a policeman wanted to talk to you."

Lisa didn't contain a roll of her eyes. She had had enough with policemen. She had been interrogated for all the information that she knew for three weeks after the Red Eye, not to mention had been placed in therapy. She was beginning to loathe how policemen and shrinks talked to her.

"Alright, thanks," she muttered as she walked away and into the crowd of men in the lobby, hoping that someone would see her and tell her why she was wanted here, and soon, too, so that she wouldn't look like a complete idiot just wandering around.

"Miss Reisert?"

Lisa spun around to see a man with a long brown trench coat on over a pinstriped suit with a brown hat on his head and black office shoes.

"Yes?" Lisa responded. The man looked like he was in his early thirties. He was good looking, light blond hair and dark brown eyes. He had a clean shave and his hair fell into his face a bit. She was actually a tad bit surprised that Cynthia hadn't been jumping all over him by now. Or maybe she had but he had shot her down.

"I'm Detective Forbes. I asked Cynthia to call you down here." He said. He looked too young to be a detective, but Lisa said nothing about that. She didn't want to insult him for something that he couldn't help.

"Nice to meet you, Detective Forbes. May I ask why I was called down here so early in the morning?" Lisa asked him politely.

"Oh, yes, well, I wanted to question you a bit. I read your background file and I know that you've had quite a bit of interrogating in the past two months done, and I'm sorry that I must interrogate you some more, but it's for good reasons." Detective Forbes explained.

Lisa gave a slight smile. "It's okay," she reassured him.

"It's just that some people get certain information out of a person and other people get different information out of that same person. And some people just lie about the information that they may or may not have received, so I just wanted to find a few things out on my own to know for certain because I have heard some interesting information and some information that is quite hard to believe." Detective Forbes explained some more.

"Detective Forbes, it's okay." Lisa said again in hopes to calm him down. She gave a bigger smile this time. Pleasing people was her business.

"Right," Detective Forbes said with a slight smile of his own, "sorry about that. I haven't really been a detective that long and I guess I still ramble on a bit. Please, follow me to some place less…crowded…so that I may interview you better." Lisa liked that he said interview instead of interrogate. It made her feel not as gloomy and annoyed at the whole situation of being questioned yet again.

Lisa followed Detective Forbes down a hallway and then through a door so that they were in her office. She wasn't surprised that he knew where it was, but it did irk her a bit. The last time that a man had been so familiar with her life it hadn't ended up so well. But she kept on telling herself that this time was different, that this was a man who swore service to the government and its people, and not to merely his wallet and own sense of pleasure in killing people, or arranging for people to be killed, for that matter.

Detective Forbes gestured for Lisa to sit down in her chair behind the desk as he pulled a chair from the side of the room over to in front of Lisa's desk.

"So," Detective Forbes said once they were both seated, "George Foreman. Have you ever met him before?"

Lisa shook her head.

Detective Forbes grunted before saying, "I did, once. He wasn't very pleasant, I can tell you that. He's the kind of man who can make enemies easily. Young, wealthy, brash, cocky, thinks he owns the world and that he's invincible. I'm sure that more than one person wanted him dead. And, as it appears, your hotel seems to be the hotspot for people to get targeted by criminals these days. First people were planning to blow up Charles Keefe, a political figure, and now a wealthy businessman has been shot. I can't imagine how much those two things put together must hurt your hotel's income of customers."

"Detective Forbes, if you're just going to sit there and lecture me on the misfortune that this hotel has been entangled up in, then I see no reason for me to stay here any longer." Lisa said as she began to stand.

"No, no, wait." Detective Forbes said anxiously. "Please, sit down, I meant no disrespect, really."

Lisa slowly sat back down in her chair, eying the detective warily. "Then what is it that you wanted to talk to me about?" She asked him curiously.

"Well, we down at the station think that Jackson Rippner, you know, the man who planned a hit on Charles Keefe, we think that he had something to do with this."

"Detective Forbes, I do not need reminding of who he is. I do not forget people like him easily." Lisa bit out angrily at Detective Forbes. It was like he was talking to her as if she was mentally retarded, or unstable in the least. "And, as I'm sure you've heard, Jackson Rippner is locked behind bars in a well-guarded prison. So, I do not know how he could be involved with this in any way." Lisa spoke as if it was obvious, and she spat out Jackson's name as if it were a curse word. She did not like to say his name, not yet. She still hadn't gotten over things.

Detective Forbes looked to her as if he was cowering in his seat from her words. Did he think that she was scolding him for his incompetence? Who knows, maybe she was.

"Yes, well, um, our resources tell us that Mr. Rippner is very…persuasive, and can easily get things that he wants. And, we think that maybe he wanted Mr. Foreman dead. We think that maybe he bribed one of the guards down at the prison to let him use a phone in order to call the people that he's been in cahoots with and arrange something. He is, after all, very—,"

"Detective Forbes!" Lisa barked at him in anger and annoyance. "I know what Jackson is like and so I do not need you to tell me. I got to know him more than I ever would have hoped for on that flight two months ago. What I do not know is how you could come to me and tell me all these things that I already know! You're a detective, aren't you? Well, snoop around. Check the phone call records down at the prison to see when the last phone calls were made and where they were addressed to. I do not care about such silly little unimportant details such as this."

Detective Forbes was staring at her with wide eyes and his mouth was open a bit, perhaps in shock, or perhaps in fear, who knew?

Lisa then realized that she had jumped to her feet somewhere in her shouting and was breathing heavily. She calmed down a bit and apologized. "I'm sorry about jumping at you, I didn't mean to. It's just that I've been stressed lately and hearing of Jackson brings back bad memories."

Detective Forbes gave a slight, nervous chuckled. "You sound as if you haven't gotten over him yet."

"And you sound as if we were once a couple, which I would rather die than be with him." Lisa said with a slight, forced smile, hoping to make the detective feel a little better. "I've bottled up my emotions for so long that I guess they all just sort of flew out at you, I apologize."

Detective Forbes put some emotion into his laugh and said, "It's alright, Miss Reisert. I'm trained to handle this kind of stuff."

Lisa smiled a little more, although it was still forced. She sure couldn't tell that he had been trained at all, let alone to handle her lashings. He looked at this moment like a lost, scared, beaten little puppy trying to look as if nothing was wrong.

Lisa wouldn't have thought this man pathetic three months ago, but she did now. She thought that he was pathetic and sad. Even though it wasn't very nice of her to think those things, she couldn't help it. But then again, three months ago she wouldn't be in this kind of position. She wouldn't even know who Jackson Rippner was and she wouldn't be yelling a poor detective for very little reason at all. Instead she would have been dealing with him as if he were a customer, trying to please him as much as she could.

Three months ago she wouldn't have described herself as pathetic and sad and lonely and scared. But she did now.

* * *

Detective Forbes questioned her for a while, asking the same questions that she'd answered before. She felt bad about yelling at him though, and so answered all of them as well as she could with as much patience as she could.

And after an hour, she was walking out of the hotel and down to her car. It was six a.m. already, and she was going to go home and go back to sleep. Today was her day off after all. She hadn't taken days off three months ago, but now she did. Sometimes she just couldn't stand the customers now, and so needed to take a well deserved break. However, the setback of this was that it gave her more time to cry and think things over and through and pick at every little detail that happened two months ago. But, she figured, it was better than exploding at a customer who didn't deserve it. Well, didn't deserve it that badly.

Detective Forbes walked her to her car and just as she was getting in he asked her out to go get a bite to eat later that day for dinner. Although she felt bad for Detective Forbes and regretted yelling at him, she was not ready yet to go out on a date with a man. She politely told him "another time perhaps" and drove off in her car toward her home as the sun just started to barely peak in the sky.

When she got to her apartment she wasted no time in hurrying to get out of the car, lock it, race toward her front door, unlock it, swish it open, get inside her apartment, and close the door and lock it. She sighed in relief when all that was done. She didn't like going out at dark, even if the sun was beginning to show in the sky. She felt safer in the broad daylight. She was also glad that she kept the lights on in her house.

Lisa ran a hand through her hair and shook it out as she deposited her keys and wallet on the kitchen counter before removing her shoes and going into her room. Lisa took off her sweater and laid it on the back of a chair in her room that sat in front of an empty desk. She had a white tank top on underneath her sweater so she wasn't completely uncovered. Besides, she was warm and she was alone in the house.

Lisa walked over to her phone and answering machine and pressed the 'play' button to see if she had any messages. It read 'no new messages' and she was about to walk back into her room when the phone decided to ring at that very moment.

Lisa picked it up and said, "Hello, this is Lisa Reisert."

"Miss Reisert? I'm Sheriff Marks and I have some bad news."

Lisa stiffened. "Oh, what is it, Sheriff Marks?" She asked cautiously. She hoped with all her soul that it didn't have anything to do with what she thought that it might.

"I'm afraid that Jackson Rippner has escaped from jail."

Lisa gasped and chocked on her air.

"We're doing everything we can to find him. I just thought that you should know. I'm very sorry." The sheriff hung up and Lisa placed the phone back down. She couldn't believe this. No, it wasn't happening. It couldn't.

Lisa tried to calm herself down and took big, deep breaths and closed her eyes for it to help. It was alright, everything was alright. She had a gun in her nightstand drawer, all she had to do was keep it with her at all times and everything would be alright. She was, after all, a better shot than _he_ was. She would be just fine.

Opening her eyes, Lisa turned around.

And she screamed.

A hand shot out and clamped around her mouth.

Staring into her eyes were piercing crystal blue orbs that radiated the coldness of the man that they belonged to.

"Hello, Leese, miss me?"

The next second all she knew was darkness.

* * *

**Hey. This is my first fanfiction for Red Eye so I hope that you liked the first chapter. I'll get started on the second chapter right away! I loved Red Eye the movie. I even started reading Red Eye fanfiction before I saw the movie. Lol. I absolutely LOVE Lisa/Jackson pairings, so you can count on my story as being one of them! Lol. I really hope that you enjoy my story. I hope the plot isn't over-used. I'll try to throw in some twists and turns and add my own flavor to it if I can.**

**Please review. XD**


	2. On the Road with a Murderer

**Hi all. I am SO sorry that I haven't been active in my updates for all of my stories in a REALLY long time! With this story, you could say that it took a long time to figure out where I wanted this to go, because when I first started it, I had no clue what I wanted to do with it. I do, however, now have a plan, and hope that I will be able to carry it out in the chapters to come. And I hope that writer's block will not seize me too much. Without further delay, here it is: Chapter 2.**

* * *

**Chapter Two: On the Road with a Murderer**

When Lisa awoke again, she noticed three things: 1. Her head hurt like crap, 2. She was in a car going who knows where, and 3. She was with Jackson Rippner.

Lisa tried to sit up from her lying position but soon after groaned and quickly regretted it. Her head hadn't hurt this bad since…great, just great. Why did Jackson always have to use his freaking head?! Lisa looked around her for a moment, observing her surroundings. She was in the backseat of a car with tinted windows, and in front of her face was Jackson Rippner's back as he sat in the driver's seat. She glared holes into his chair, but unfortunately, he didn't feel the heat in the back of his head. It was too bad; really, he could use being warmed up a bit since he was so very cold.

Lisa suddenly felt an itch on her head and tried to reach up and scratch it, only to find that her hands were bound behind her. Wiggling her legs, she found out that her ankles were bound together as well, and so were her knees. Seriously, her knees? What did he really think that she was going to do? Crack his head open in between her thighs?

Lisa felt a chill run down her spine. _Whoa there,_ she thought, _no need to get myself thinking on that path._ Moving on mentally, she groaned again when she found that her mouth was bound as well. And the cloth tasted terrible. It also rubbed up against her sore skin roughly.

"Stop it," a hiss came from the driver's seat.

Lisa glared again at the headrest for the driver's seat. She noticed some of his brown hair sticking out on either side. Lisa suddenly wondered how cocky he would be if she found a way to shave his head while he slept. Of course, that would never happen, because he was probably a really light sleeper, and if she did manage to pull it off, he would kill her before she could scream for help.

Lisa shook her head suddenly at the thought. No. Besides, Jackson Rippner would _not_ look good bald. She liked his hair too much for that to happen.

Once again moving on, Lisa tried to throw herself up into a sitting position…and failed, causing her to groan again in pain. For some reason, her butt hurt a lot. The sudden realization made her eyes widen. He wouldn't have…..

No, she reasoned with herself. He wouldn't have, because this was Jackson, and not some low-life creep who would take advantage of her while she was out. He must just have thrown her into the backseat on her butt really hard or something like that.

Yeah, something like that…

The thought got Lisa arguing with herself. Was she actually _defending_ him? Was she actually thinking that he _wasn't_ a low-life and a creep who stalks people and kidnaps them and twists them to his own demented enjoyment?

Lisa heard a growl from in front of her and almost yelped—if she was not gagged, that is—when Jackson turned a sharp corner and her head bonked into the door. She groaned again in pain, which seemed like the hundredth time already in, what, three minutes?

"I said stop it!" Jackson shouted from the front seat, quickly losing his temper. Well, wasn't he just Mr. Sunshine this morning? Or was it afternoon? Lisa wasn't sure, but whatever time it was, she wasn't really sure she wanted to know how long she had been out and how long she had been in the clutches of Jackson while unconscious.

_Well,_ Lisa thought bitterly, _if I didn't keep getting hurt because of you then I wouldn't be annoying you with my pain, now would I?_

Lisa closed her eyes briefly before opening them again. She didn't like this, being helpless. Sure, she hadn't been much better off when she was on the plane with him, but at least she wasn't bound and gagged and was sitting upright. Also, in the privacy of just Jackson and her, he could do a lot more things to her and get away with them, with no one around to stop him, and that scared her most of all. No one would come to her rescue. No one would even know.

Lisa saved herself from being scared too badly by reassuring herself. Sure, Jackson was a cold and vicious and vile criminal, but he was just a murderer, nothing more. Well, maybe he was a psycho too, but that was it, a murderer and a psycho. And in all of the time that she had known Jackson—which was way too long in her opinion—he seemed like nothing more than a murderer and a psycho. She had been thinking about it these past two months, ever since the flight, even though it probably wasn't the healthiest thing for her to be doing. He wasn't a rapist. Jackson was above that. He may throw around a woman and injure her and try to kill her, but he wouldn't touch her, and Lisa felt confident in that theory. He wasn't _that_ sick and twisted, no; not in that way.

Lisa had to laugh at herself. Again she was thinking higher of him than he deserved! Of course he was sick and twisted! Was she saying that being a murderer and a psycho was above being a rapist? Of course not! They were all the same, in a way. They were all terrible, heinous crimes—except for being a psycho, because sometimes you really can't help losing your mind—and not one was better or worse than the other. Raping destroyed lives. Killing destroyed lives. And in Jackson's case, being a psycho did kind of destroy lives, in its own little way.

Lisa sighed as best she could with the gag in her mouth. Why did these things always have to happen to her? Why did they keep on happening to her? And why did no one ever stop it? No one was there to help her that day in the parking lot. No stranger would have wanted to get involved for the sake of helping someone they didn't even know. No one was there to help her on that plane, she'd had to think and act for herself and defend herself against a blood-thirsty monster. And no one was there to help her now. Lisa bitterly thought how life must secretly hate her.

Good things didn't happen to good people, and bad things didn't happen to bad people. It was all chance, everything. Life was a game of chance. Sometimes you got lucky, and sometimes you weren't so lucky. Karma was just a figment of the imagination. She'd done a lot of good in her life, always being kind and polite and nice to people, always helping out. And how did Karma repay her? By doing terrible things to her because Karma didn't exist. Life was like the flip of a coin, sometimes you get heads, and sometimes you get tails, and it's all based on luck and chance. _And_ aerodynamics and the laws of gravity, but that was unimportant at the moment.

What was important was Lisa trying to figure out a way to escape this predicament she had found herself in. And, what was also important, was that Lisa had to stop thinking along the same lines as her other thought processes had been, because they were all not getting her anywhere, and some of them were quite…on the disturbing side.

Lisa looked all around her again; studying her surroundings very carefully, even the back of Jackson and all those little brown hairs sticking out from behind the headrest. All those luscious, chocolaty brown locks of soft—

Lisa shook her head. No. No. No. No. No. She wasn't thinking this. She couldn't be thinking this. She mustn't be thinking this. Besides, she didn't know how soft his hair was, it's not like she ever felt it before. But now, having nothing more interesting to stare at besides his hair, she couldn't help but find herself wondering how his hair _would_ feel underneath her fingertips.

And Lisa suddenly wondered if he had drugged her with something before or while she had been passed out, or if his head butt had damaged some part of her brain, because she was sure that she was going crazy.

Lisa closed her eyes and refused to look at anything anymore. If all she could do was to stare at Jackson's hair then she wouldn't give herself the opportunity to look at anything. She would try to go back to sleep until Jackson had taken them to wherever he was going, or at least until she came up with a solution.

* * *

_Jackson threw her up against the wall before pressing himself up against her, holding her by her chin and breathing down upon her face. The bathroom had begun to look claustrophobic to her._

_His fingers pushed back the slight amount of cloth covering her scar before he scowled at her and threw her up against the counter in the airplane bathroom, lifting her up by her throat as she struggled to be able to breathe again or to find something to hold on to so she wouldn't suffocate at the strangling by the strong and dangerous man in front of her._

_Jackson chased her throughout her house with a freaking butcher's knife._

_Jackson threw her over the banister and down the stairs of her own home until she collided with a door, slumping down onto the ground in immensely unbearable pain. _

_Jackson just stared at her with those cold, icy blue eyes, in different situations, there were just flashes of him staring into her eyes._

Lisa gasped as she awoke, actually making more than a muffled noise now that the gag had seemingly found its way off of her mouth.

"Good, you're awake."

Lisa turned to where the noise was being made, directly to her left. She stared at him in shock and horror as he kept his eyes on the road, pretending as if he didn't notice, and pretending rather well too.

She looked around her before sitting up straight, realizing that she had slid down in the seat a bit. She was in the passenger's seat now. When had he moved her there? How long had she been out? Why did he take off her gag?

"Did you know that you thrash in your sleep?" Jackson told her, making seemingly light conversation as if nothing terrible had ever transpired between the two. He kept his eyes on the road the whole time with a poker face, his eyes glancing over to Lisa only once when he was sure that she was looking before he looked back to the road half a second later.

Lisa looked around again a bit more, confused about the sudden situation. Her hands were still bound but now they were bound in front of her and the cloth around her knees had been removed too, but she refused to think of the thoughts that she had had earlier about why she would need to be bound around her knees. Didn't Jackson know that right now she could harm him? Now that she was sitting within arm's reach of him?

Lisa turned back to look at Jackson with a confused expression on her face. "What?" She asked, as if he would somehow understand that she meant "what's going on?" instead of just the vague question of "what?"

"Were you having a nightmare?" Jackson asked; his eyes still on the road.

Lisa stared at him like he was a loon that had just escaped from an insane asylum.

"What?" She asked him again before turning away and looking out of the window. "I don't see how that's any of your business." She responded bitterly.

She heard Jackson make a tusking noise behind her head. "Now, now, is that any way to speak to me after I just made your situation a bit more comfortable? And it was not easy doing all that while you were kicking and shoving and clawing in your sleep. I think that the least I deserve is some answers." He sounded like he was genuinely hurt, although she knew that it was his acting skills working right now instead of his emotions and feelings. Jackson Rippner didn't _have_ any feelings or emotions, other than greed, anger, wrath, frustration, and cruelty, although Lisa wasn't really sure if cruelty was exactly an emotion.

"Why do you care?" She bit out as she turned back to look at the road in front of her.

"Come now Leese; let's try to be civil, shall we?" Jackson spoke as if he were talking to a little child who didn't want to play with the other children.

Lisa spat out a short, emotionless laugh. "Since when have you ever tried to be civil?"

"Leese," Jackson warned.

"I see you got your voice back. It's a shame sometimes what medicine can do these days, and in such a short time too. I would have thought that pen wound would have taken much longer to heal, considering how deeply wedged into your throat it had been and how badly you were wheezing the last time I saw you." Lisa said angrily.

Jackson came to an abrupt halt and Lisa flew forward, smacking her forehead on the dashboard. She pulled away in pain. "Ow," she whimpered.

"You know, Leese," Jackson said as he took off his seatbelt and turned to face her full-on, "I'm beginning to see now why you don't have any friends or why you haven't had a date in _years._ It's because you can be _very_ unpleasant when you want to be."

"For your information, I was asked out on a date before you kidnapped me!" Lisa retorted, turning her head to face the window, not being able to face him.

"And you turned it down." Jackson said. "Detective Forbes, the clueless and annoying; sad excuse for a 'detective.' I'm glad to know that I'm not the only guy that you lash out at."

"You bugged me!" Lisa accused angrily, turning to face him full-on as well, although not being able to shift in her seat much so that her whole body face him like his did hers. She still had her seatbelt on and couldn't undo it.

"I had to find some way to entertain myself." Jackson defended with a smirk.

"But you were in the hospital!" Lisa reasoned.

"Well, technically, the bugs were in your apartment and office since the last time I set them up, a few months ago when I first started my surveillance of you."

"You mean _stalking_." Lisa said vividly.

Jackson waved it off. "Same basic principles," he dismissed. "Anyways, don't change the subject. Even if you were asked out on a date, you told him no. So that doesn't count since you didn't actually go on a real date."

Lisa turned back to look out of the passenger window. "What do you care? It's my life."

"Because watching a boring life can be very boring," Jackson stated matter-of-factly.

"Well then stop watching my life." Lisa said angrily.

"Believe me, I would _gladly_ stop, but I'm afraid that I am unable to." Jackson said.

"Of course you are." Lisa muttered to herself, still looking out of the passenger side window.

"Look at me." Jackson said.

Lisa didn't, and continued to look out of the side window.

Jackson growled and reached over, grabbing her chin roughly and harshly yanking it toward him so that she was now facing him. Jackson hated being ignored, especially by Lisa. He didn't know why, but it bugged him more when she ignored him than when everyone else did.

"I said, '_Look at me._'" He muttered dangerously to her, staring into her eyes with a cold look in his blue ones. He could see a shiver run down Lisa's back and was glad. She _should_ be afraid of him, she had every reason to. And he was glad that he still made her fear him, even now, even after she had bested him two months ago.

"Like it or not, you're stuck with me. So, until you can get over this little childish fit you're having, just remember that I can make things _much_ worse for you. Understand?" Jackson said in that same dangerously low voice.

Lisa felt like his eyes were piercing into her very soul, as if he could see right through her. His eyes were always what unnerved her the most. Even though they were stunningly breathtaking, they also felt so cold and evil, and knowing.

She nodded weakly and Jackson searched her eyes for something. She wasn't sure what, or if he found it. She just noticed that his eyes traveled down to her lips—or so she assumed—for a second or two, before traveling back up to her eyes.

And then he abruptly let go of her chin and leaned back into his seat, re-buckling his seatbelt. Lisa was left dumbfounded, still staring at him blankly, a little confused.

Jackson turned his keys in the ignition and started the car back up again, after having turned it off when he stopped on the side of the road. He drove back onto the empty road, going well past sixty miles an hour.

Lisa finally turned back to look out of her window. There was a good twenty minutes of silence, in which Lisa found rather awkward. She didn't really want to speak with him, but the silence was really starting to bug her. She kept on thinking back to when he had been looking into her eyes. His eyes had briefly strayed down toward her lips, and thinking about it gave her a weird tingling sensation down in the pit of her stomach. Lisa didn't really know quite what it was.

Suddenly, and without warning, Jackson broke the silence. "Would you really rather die than be with me?" He asked nonchalantly, as if asking her about the weather.

Lisa choked on her air. _What?!_ It took her several seconds until she could properly breathe again. When her lungs could function once more, she turned toward him, giving him a look like he was insane or something.

When Lisa didn't say anything, Jackson continued on, seemingly innocent from his expression, tone of voice, and eyes. Lisa, however, knew better than to think this of him though. "I mean, really, I know I'm no _Prince Charming_, but saying that you would rather die is rather somewhat extreme."

Lisa felt her face heat up and flush. This was _so_ embarrassing. However, she responded, not wanting to give him the satisfaction in embarrassing her so much as she wouldn't be able to form coherent words when in his presence. "It was not extreme, it was merely the truth. I would rather die a thousand deaths than be with you in that way." She said harshly.

Jackson faced a mock look of hurt and said, "Ouch. That was a bit melodramatic, wasn't it?"

"Not in the least bit." Lisa said, not caring to spare his feelings, which she wasn't even sure if he had.

"Wow, you are surprisingly cold today." Jackson said.

"You would know." Lisa bit back at him.

"Leese," Jackson said warningly, "You're trying my patience."

"Good," Lisa grumbled as she slumped down in her seat and crossed her arms over her chest, still looking out of the passenger's side window.

"What are you doing? Pouting like a little child?" said Jackson tauntingly.

"I _am_ not!" Lisa shouted at him, turning to look his way.

Jackson turned to her for a couple seconds, giving her a knowing look, before turning back to the road. "You just proved my point."

"I—" She started, but then didn't continue, not seeing the point in it. She didn't like giving up, especially not when it would give Jackson the satisfaction of knowing that he had won. She hated it when he won. His ego was already rather up there a bit too high.

She turned back to look out of her car door's window.

Trees and plants passed by, all incredibly green. She wondered where they were, but didn't ask. Jackson hated questions. That was one thing she learned on the Red Eye flight two months back. She hoped that she would be able to find out later, but for right now, she was growing increasingly tired.

Lisa wasn't sure how much time had passed, but before she knew it, her eyes were drooping closed, and all that was able to be heard was the soft lulling sound of the car as it whizzed on by.

She wasn't sure if falling asleep right next to Jackson in the car was the best idea, but right now she was surprisingly tired, and she'd deal with the consequences later.

* * *

**Well, what did you think? How was it? I hope it was alright and satisfied all those who had to wait so long for it. I personally am not very pleased with it. I don't think that they were very in character, myself. However, I hope that you all enjoyed it, and again, I am incredibly sorry for the inconveniences caused. Well, until next time. Please review! :)**


	3. When We First Met

**Hey. First off I want to say thank you to all of you who have reviewed my story so far, I am very appreciative! I had a little bit of writer's block with this one, but I don't think that it was quite too bad. Well, here it is, Chapter 3. I hope you like it. ^__^**

* * *

**Chapter Three: When We First Met**

_Lisa glanced in surprise and gratefulness at the young man who helped her calm down an angry man waiting in line for his flight. The first thing she noticed about him was his height, how he was taller than her, but not too much so that it was a great difference in between their heights. Next were his smooth-looking brown locks of hair, just a few shades darker than her own honey-colored brown curls. She noticed that he had a good build, even under his clothes. He didn't look overly-muscular or anything like that, but he did look strong. And finally, when he turned around to look back at her, she couldn't help but be absorbed by his light blue, crystal eyes. They were entrancing. His voice, his looks, his eyes, everything about him, even the very air around him, held power and strength and, she had noticed something else but hadn't realized what it was at the time—not until later when his true intentions came out—that he also held terror. _

_At first glance—and, she had to admit, her first impression—he seemed like the perfect man. He defended her, a stranger, and he was kind to her. If only she had known what would happen oh so soon._

The first thing that Lisa registered was the bright light pounding on her eyelids, trying to get in. Bringing her hand up to shield her eyes, Lisa slowly opened them, blinking a few times to bid the sleep away.

She looked around to realize that they were on the outskirts of a city, far enough from the center so that she couldn't draw someone's attention so that they could help her, but close enough to be surrounded by civilization.

"Where are we?" She heard her voice croak, and winced at the sound of it. Did she always sound this bad after she had just woken up?

She was still in the car, and was still sitting in the seat next to Jackson Rippner, tormentor extraordinaire.

Without even turning to look at her, Jackson replied, "That's not important."

Lisa snorted. "Right," she retorted, "who would want to know where they are?"

"I don't appreciate you mocking me." Jackson told her.

"And I don't appreciate you kidnapping me." She snapped at him, turning to face him.

Lisa could visibly see Jackson's jaw clenched. "Tell me why every time I'm with you I feel like I'm talking to a five-year-old." It was rhetorical, of course.

"Then take me back if you don't want to be around me. I don't see what you need with me, and since you won't tell me anything, then I can assume that I'm not needed." Lisa said. "So take me back."

"Now Lisa, you know I can't do that."

"Well I don't see why the heck not." She muttered to herself. She looked over to the clock in the dashboard to see that it was four forty-five in the afternoon. She sighed and turned to stare back out of the car window, her arms crossed over her chest.

Lisa felt disgusting. Not only had Jackson touched her multiple times, first to get her into the car and to tie her up; and secondly to move her to the front and unbind her a little, but also because she hadn't taken a shower since the day that he had kidnapped her and she was still wearing the same clothes. She didn't know how long it had been, exactly, but she knew that she really wanted a shower, badly, and she could feel her stomach starting to demand food, but—thank goodness—it had yet to grumble. She would be so embarrassed if Jackson knew that she was practically starving. He already had enough power over her as it was.

It was a good other hour of silence, though, before Jackson finally turned his car into a motel in a small little rest-stop town a ways from the city they had just been in earlier. Lisa looked at it with excitement. Sure, going to a motel was not the most exciting thing in the world, and it was made even less pleasant when you were most likely going to share a room with Jackson so that he could keep an eye on you, but she would finally be able to get a shower. Lisa made sure to hide her happiness from Jackson, though. She didn't want him to see it.

Jackson parked the car in the parking lot and undid his seatbelt. He turned in the car to face her and said sternly with a serious expression on his face, "Now, Leese, we're going to get a room and stay in this town until tomorrow. You had better not try anything, understand?"

Lisa gulped and nodded under his fierce and smoldering gaze. He was really being serious. But then again, this was Jackson. He was always serious.

Jackson stared into her eyes for a second more before he got out of the car, closing his door quietly yet quickly at the same time, and walked around the front of the car to the passenger's side.

Jackson opened the car door and leaned over Lisa to unbuckle her seatbelt. Lisa's heart fluttered and her lungs seemed to stop working. That always happened when Jackson got close to her, even when his intents were violent—she just didn't feel her heart fluttering underneath all of the fear when he was being violent.

But in a flash Jackson was standing back up and Lisa's heart was beating normally again and her lungs were working, allowing her to breathe. She swung her legs out of the car—with great difficulty, mind you, and tried to stand up out of the car—

—and fell right back down again on her butt, which was already still somewhat sore from earlier. Lisa tried her hardest to stifle a groan, remembering how Jackson had been annoyed earlier from her constant groaning. But, seriously, it was his fault she was groaning. However, Lisa snubbed that thought before she got off again on a long rant inside her head how everything was his fault and he wouldn't even let her slightly complain about the pain that he was causing and had caused her.

Jackson sighed and undid the bind around her hands. While untying it, though, he didn't look once away from her eyes in a warning glare. After he had untied her hands, he bent down and untied her ankles. The millisecond that every part of her was free, Lisa wasted no time in bringing her leg up and hitting Jackson in the groin.

Jackson doubled over in pain on the asphalt of the parking lot and Lisa hurriedly crawled over to the driver's side of the car so that she could exit out of that door and make a run for the motel to get them to call the police.

As quick as Lisa tried to be, just as she had opened the driver's door, however, she felt a hand grab her right ankle and pull her back. Lisa was about to scream when Jackson's hand covered her mouth and he had a murderous look on his face.

Jackson had let go of Lisa's ankle by now and his hand found its way around her throat. "Don't you _ever_ do that _again_!" he growled at her. Lisa's hands flew up to Jackson's hand that was around her neck and choking her. She tried to pry it off of her, but it was no use. Jackson was just way too strong for her, and she was weakening by the second.

"Nighty-night, Lisa. Sleep tight." Jackson taunted her with a menacing voice and a wicked smirk.

Everything went black.

* * *

"_Thank you." Lisa told the handsome young man she had just met._

"_Oh, not at all," he said with a charming smile. "I was just back-up. You got the ball rolling."_

_She smiled and laughed a little. _

_They engaged in a short conversation, and he invited her to the Tex Mex to grab a drink with her. He was oh so charming and kind. Later she would think what a good actor he really was. He would be great if he ever went to Hollywood._

_She declined him with excuses, and he seemed to understand that it might be awkward._

_Just as Lisa was walking away from watching a young girl tell her mom that she'd be fine on her own on the plane, she caught sight of the young man sitting alone at the Tex Mex. He had just ordered a drink and Lisa was seriously thinking about joining him._

_After changing her shirt that had iced mocha all over it, Lisa walked back out and as she walked past the Tex Mex, she spotted the man again. Her step faltered and Lisa took a great leap of courage and walked over to him, deciding to join him._

_They chatted a little, and then the man said that if he could guess what drink she liked, then she had to order it. _

_And after a few missed guesses, he hit the nail, a grapefruit Sea Breeze. Lisa's heart had clenched momentarily and she immediately turned to the bartender and asked for a Bay Breeze. She didn't like that he got it right, even after a couple wrong guesses. Her eyes shifted over to him to see what he would do._

_They got talking a bit more, exchanging a little information on each other._

_And then she had gotten her Bay Breeze. And wow, had that tasted strong! _

_They had told their names then. Jackson. Jackson Rippner. Even though he was slightly creepy and there was definitely something off about him, something that Lisa couldn't quite pinpoint, but knew somewhere down deep, she had felt her heart flutter just by looking at him. Jackson Rippner. She couldn't stop saying his name in her head. She liked it. It had a nice ring to it, it sounded somewhat unique to her, in a way._

_And then she thought of something._

_Jackson Rippner. Jack the Ripper._

_That wasn't very nice of his parents at all._

_Later, she would come to realize how much that name fit him. Jack the Ripper._

Lisa opened her eyes slowly. Her head swam and her neck hurt. She tried to think back to what had happened. She remembered Jackson. He was angry at her trying to escape. She could feel his hands on her neck all over again in memory, and instantly thought that she'd have a pretty bad bruise on her neck—she was sure of that. His other attempts at strangling her in the past had left bruises which had taken quite a long time to heal.

Lisa tried to bring her hands to feel around her neck.

Only she couldn't.

Metal clinked and she was stopped. There was a cold feeling against both of Lisa's wrists and something cut into them, making her gasp.

Lisa turned her head back to look up at her hands which were held above her head. Each was encased in a single handcuff. There were two sets of handcuffs, and the handcuffs that weren't around her wrists were encircling a bar of the metal headboard of the bed that she was currently "resting" in.

Lisa's mouth fell open. She tugged at her wrists and the metal dug into her flesh even more, stinging it.

"The handcuffs aren't going to break or anything, you know."

Lisa turned her head back down and looked across the room from where she was. Jackson was standing in front of an open door, the mirror inside all fogged up. Lisa's jaw dropped even further and her eyes widened.

Jackson was standing there, wet hair dripping water that cascaded over his pale, muscled chest and abdomen. The water then traveled further only to disappear into a fuzzy white towel that was wrapped around his hips. Jackson's arms were up as he tried to dry the top part of his shoulder-length soaked brown hair—which now looked rather black or at least a very dark brown—with a white towel that matched the one around his waist.

Jackson looked at Lisa curiously. She still had her mouth dropped and her eyes were still wide as she gazed as Jackson's barely covered, very well toned body. At first he didn't understand why she was like that, but after a second he understood.

It was when Jackson chuckled with that evil yet oh so seductive smirk of his that Lisa finally turned away, a firm blush on her cheeks—she was sure. "Put some clothes on." Lisa told him. "Not everyone wants to see that."

"You must not be a part of everyone, then." Jackson said with that same smirk.

Lisa was sure that her cheeks were getting even redder. Darn him and that smirk and that voice and those eyes and that _body_—darn every part of him! He was made to ruin her from the inside out!

And he was _loving_ every minute of it—the nerve!

"Just put some clothes on," Lisa said stubbornly. "Please," she added.

"Alright, alright," Jackson chuckled, "you old spinster."

Lisa felt her cheeks flare again. _Spinster!_ How dare he?! He was older than she was most likely, yet it was alright for guys not to be married but not for girls to be unmarried?! What an arrogant, conceited, self-centered, rude, egotistical, haughty, bigheaded, proud, overconfident, vain, smug, stuck-up, self-satisfied, high and mighty jerk! He deserved to be taught a thing or two.

In fact, Lisa thought with a smirk, he deserved to have his butt handed to him again by her or another person of the female population like she had done before. Maybe _then_ that would fix him.

But only fix his _insides_—there wasn't a _thing_ wrong with his _outsides._

Lisa turned her head and looked back toward the bathroom door to see that, in her thought ranting, Jackson had changed into some clothes and was now standing in the exact same spot as he had been standing previously, fully clothed. Either she had had a very long thought rant or Jackson was just a v_ery_ fast dresser. Lisa didn't really want to think about the latter of the two because then that meant that she would have to fight against envisioning him naked, even though she had seen quite a bit when he was only wearing a towel, she had still missed the vital…structures…and if she envisioned him naked then that would mean that her mind would use the long-unused imagination that she had.

Lisa could see Jackson's lips moving but wasn't paying enough attention to actually understand the words in the voice that she was hearing. Snapping herself out of her rather disturbing—yet somewhat intriguing—thoughts, Lisa blinked a few times and said, "I'm sorry, could you repeat that? I didn't quite catch it."

Jackson had a visible look of annoyance on his face, but he repeated anyways. "I_ said_, 'We'll be leaving by tomorrow morning.' And I don't think that I need to remind you that if you even so much as _try_ to scream or attract someone's attention, you'll be seeing black for a couple days, and wake up to find some pretty nasty bruises. Got it?"

Lisa glared at Jackson, because, really, what else could she do, lying here chained to the bed? "Just don't try anything. Don't forget that I can still kick your butt." She said. Juvenile, yes, but it just came out without her even thinking about it.

Jackson snorted and walked over to the window—the blinds all closed, naturally—and lifted one up a little, peeking through. "Don't kid yourself. You can't do me any harm while you're tied to the bed like that."

True, it would be hard to fight Jackson off with her hands should he choose to get violent, but her hands were the only things tied. Her legs weren't, and were free for the usage. "Let's not forget our little…_fray_ that happened not too long ago in the parking lot." She said with a smirk.

Jackson turned suddenly to look at her, his face blank. For emphases, Lisa slid up her legs so that her knees were sticking up in the air. "You were bested by me before, two months ago. What's to say that you won't get bested again?"

A dark look flashed over Jackson's face briefly, before vanishing back into the blank expression he had worn just seconds before. "I swear," he said, briefly gesturing to her legs with his hand as he slowly walked over to Lisa, his eyes never leaving hers', "if you _ever_ pull something like that again, I can guarantee that you won't see the light of day for a very, _very_ long time. And besides, before, two months ago, was a fluke—a one-time thing. It won't be happening again, I'll make sure of that."

"Careful, Jack," Lisa said dauntingly, playing with his hated nickname on her tongue, "history always finds a way to repeat itself."

And in a flash, Jackson was sitting on the bed beside Lisa, leaning over her slightly, his hand pulling down the fabric of her tank top a little over her right breast—just enough to show the angry scar that gleamed like fire compared to the rest of her very pale skin. When Lisa had realized what was happening, Jackson was gazing at her scar with a smirk. Lisa looked down at his hand—well, as best as she could—horrified when he started to lightly stroke it with his thumb.

"You sure you want to be believing that?" he whispered dangerously, his eyes trailing up to meet Lisa's terrified ones, the smirk making his eyes glint with what could only be taken as evil—by Lisa, at least.

It only took Lisa a second or two, before everything finally settled in, and she got over her shock and horror.

Lisa's face scrunched up in anger and she sneered at him, flailing her legs everywhere like a tantrum-throwing child, twisting and turning her body this way and that, trying to get Jackson away from her.

"Get away from me!" she screeched at him, her wrists yanking against the handcuffs. "You monster!"

Jackson jumped back away from her quickly, his smirk smaller, but still there. "Still a sore topic, I see."

"I HATE YOU!" screamed Lisa. "I hate you! I hate you! I _hate_ you!"

Jackson flew to her, covering her mouth with his right hand and using his left arm to try and hold her down. "Lisa," he hissed, "keep quiet!"

Jackson's hand snapped away from Lisa's mouth as a look of surprise and anger crossed his face. "You bit me!" he could scarcely believe that she would do that. Lisa glared at him angrily, trying desperately to burn holes through his very being, but also failing terribly.

A slap could be heard as Lisa's head flew to her right, a red mark on her left cheek. Tears welled up behind her eyes and she bit her lip, as if trying to distract herself from her cheek's stinging.

Jackson stood up from the bed, glaring at Lisa, and walked back to the bathroom, grabbing a band-aid. Lisa had quite a hard bite, breaking the skin of his hand with her teeth.

When Jackson returned to the room, after rinsing off his hand, rubbing disinfectant on it, and putting a band-aid on, Jackson saw that Lisa was still in the exact same position as he had left her in—she had moved a muscle. Circling around the bed toward the side where Lisa's head was turned, Jackson caught something, a glint on her cheek caused by the light. Upon getting closer, Jackson realized that they were tears. Lisa was crying. She wasn't shaking, but she was still biting her lip and her eyes were closed, and the water making its way down her cheeks in droplets were unmistakably tears.

The events since her kidnap were finally starting to sink in.

"Leese," Jackson called softly, and Lisa trembled a little before opening her eyes and blinking back her tears. "Look at me, Leese."

Lisa hesitantly obliged. She turned her head slightly to look into his eyes dead on. Jackson didn't fail to notice that her eyes were red, her lip was bleeding from her biting it so hard, and her cheek was starting to bruise. She wasn't going to be fighting him anytime soon, he knew. Her spirit had left her for now, and so had the will to stop him.

Jackson sat down on the edge of the one and only bed, beside her, and looked over at her face, his hands in his lap. Jackson's own face was schooled to be blank, emotionless. This girl was his weakness, and he knew it. And one day, he felt like she would be his undoing as well. Jackson moved his right hand toward her face, and she flinched away, scrunching her eyes up, preparing for the blow.

Jackson felt a little twinge of something, deep down. He surprised Lisa by gently rubbing the blood off of her trembling bottom lip with his thumb, unknowingly sending tingles down Lisa's spine.

"Leese, tell me," he spoke softly, and Lisa had to open her eyes to make sure that it was still Jackson sitting in front of her, and not someone else. "When we first met, what did you think of me?"

Lisa could feel heat rise to her face as she closed her eyes at the memory. She was somewhat glad that she had a bruise on one of her cheeks, because it would make it all that much harder for Jackson to see that she was blushing. "I thought what you wanted me to think." She whispered. "You were too good to be true. After all that had happened to me, you seemed like a man that I could grow to like, to trust."

"And then I threw it all away." It was a fact, not an opinion.

Lisa nodded, her lip still trembling at the feel of Jackson's thumb on it.

Truth be told, Lisa had thought about what they could have been had Jackson not turned out to be a psycho-killer—they both had. And although each time the topic came up in Lisa's head, she had denied it severely. Jackson had not bothered denying it. Yes, he knew that they could have been well together. They were alike in many ways, more than Lisa would surely like to admit.

Jackson removed his thumb from Lisa's bottom lip—after which, it had stopped trembling—and stood up, walking away from Lisa and toward the small desk in the corner of the room of the motel that had been given to them. He sat down and pulled a laptop out of a bag that Lisa hadn't noticed before.

As he started typing away, working on something probably for work, Lisa turned her head away from him and closed her eyes, not going to sleep, but just resting. She needed to think, think about what was going on, and how she was going to get away. She listened to the rhythmic sounds of Jackson's pounding away on the keyboard. He was quite the fast typer.

Before Lisa knew it, her thoughts had taken her to what Jackson had said just a few minutes earlier. When she first met him, she had felt like maybe he was the one, the one who could bring her out of her miserable routine that she had gotten herself into. Maybe he could save her from her loneliness, and her fear and worry and pain. Maybe he could erase her memories of that one dreadful day in the parking lot that haunted her still.

But, as Jackson had said, he had thrown it all away: Her feelings, her hopes, and their possibility. Lisa wondered what Jackson had thought when they first met. Granted, he had been stalking her for eight weeks prior to their first "meeting," but he hadn't actually physically talked to her, or stood right in front of her. Bitterness swept in as the realization struck—and it struck hard. She was just a job; she had just been another meaningless job to him, another dollar in his wallet. He didn't feel anything for her, no matter how soft or gentle he could seem at times. He was a good actor; he had already proven that before. And she didn't feel anything for him either.

Another silent tear escaped her eye and cascaded down her cheek.

Not a single thing.

* * *

**Ooo. I don't know about you, but I think she's lying to herself, about more than one thing too. ;)**

**Let me know what you think. I tried not to make any mistakes, but if I did, I'm sorry. I'm always happy to hear theories or suggestions. ^___^**

**Until next time. **

**Ciao. **

**Love ya, mean it. :)**


	4. Motel Prisoner

**Hey guys. Looks like I'm finally breaking out of the 3-chapter rut that I've stuck myself in with all of my stories with a FOURTH CHAPTER!! Woo! Lol. I'm feeling very inspired with this story right now--hence the semi-quicker than usual update. I'll try to hurry with the next chapter, since I already kind of know what to do. This chapter is a bit longer than the rest, and I hope that you enjoy it. ^__^**

* * *

**Chapter Four: Motel Prisoner**

Lisa wasn't sure how much time had passed when she opened her eyes again. She hadn't fallen asleep, but had instead just thought and listened to Jackson's typing. He had just stopped and Lisa opened her eyes and turned her head to face him to see that he was closing his laptop and putting it back in his black bag.

Jackson looked up and met her eyes.

Lisa looked away and found a digital clock on the bedside table, its little red numbers flashing seven thirty-six.

"Hungry?" Asked Jackson like the civilized person that Lisa knew he was not.

"No," Lisa forced out, even though she was beyond starving. And then her traitorous stomach growled mutinously.

"You sure about that?" asked Jackson, his right eyebrow raised as he looked at her.

Lisa glared. "I'm sure," she said through gritted teeth, angry that her stomach had betrayed her and alerted Jackson to her hungriness.

"Alright then, you're call." He said right before there was a knock on the door to their motel room.

Jackson walked over and opened it up, positioning himself just so; so that the person at the door wouldn't see Lisa.

"Here's your order, sir." A man said from in front of Jackson. Lisa couldn't see him because Jackson was blocking the way.

Jackson took what the man was carrying—Lisa heard something that sounded like a plastic bag rustle—and said, "Thank you." He handed him some money, and the door closed. Turning around, Lisa could see that he was indeed holding a plastic bag with Chinese characters on the front.

"You ordered Chinese?" she asked, surprised.

"Obviously," he replied as he moved over to the small eating table in the room.

"When?" asked Lisa. "I didn't hear you call them."

"I have my ways."

Lisa rolled her eyes.

Jackson took out some boxes and two sets of chopsticks. He opened up one of the boxes and Lisa's mouth watered. She could smell it all the way over on the bed, and it smelled unbelievably good—especially to someone who would even eat sushi, she was so hungry.

Jackson looked over at Lisa and met her longing eyes. "Are you absolutely _sure_ that you don't want anything?" he asked with a knowing smirk.

Lisa nodded slowly, her mouth shut tight so she wouldn't drool at the delicious smell of the Chinese food, which was surprisingly steaming.

As Jackson turned back to look at the Asian-styled boxes full of Chinese food, Lisa saw him shake his head with a small smile gracing his lips—a genuine smile. She didn't think that she was supposed to see that.

Jackson pulled out a chair and sat down at the table, opening up his chopsticks and beginning to eat out of one of the boxes.

Lisa shut her eyes tight together and bit her lip so hard that she was sure that it was bleeding. She would not think of food, she would not think of food, she would not think of—

Suddenly she felt something around her wrists—human flesh contacting with hers. And then the painful metal was gone, and her left wrist was free.

Lisa peeked through barely open eyes to see that Jackson was standing beside her and releasing her from her bonds. He leaned over her and reached for her right hand. Lisa's heart picked up speed again and her lungs froze right in the middle of a breath.

Jackson undid the handcuffs that attached Lisa's left wrist to the bed. He now held both handcuffs in his left hand. He took Lisa's left wrist in his right hand and jerked her off of the bed.

Lisa gasped in pain at his harshness and almost fell onto the floor from the force he used. She didn't have time to steady herself before he was pulling her over to the table.

Lisa looked around, memorizing everything in the room. She had to start thinking of how to escape.

Jackson pulled out a chair beside his at the table and shoved her onto it, quickly bending down and handcuffing each of her ankles to the two front legs of the chair.

Jackson stood back up again and walked over to his seat and sat down. He pushed a box of food and a pair of chopsticks over toward Lisa.

Lisa was actually too stunned to do anything. One reason why she was stunned was the improbability that the same handcuffs that had fit only slightly loosely around her wrists now fit snug around her ankles. Either that meant that she had tiny ankles, or that she had really fat wrists. She preferred the small ankles option, it sounded nicer.

Jackson glanced over at Lisa. "Aren't you going to eat? If not, I can chain you back on the bed."

Did Jackson realize how _dirty_ that sounded? He must have, Lisa thought, because all guys took most everything in a dirty way. She remembered a week and a half ago, this one family with two teenage sons stayed at the Lux Atlantic, and one of them had said something that could have been taken nastily, and the other said, "That's what she said." And they both laughed. Lisa only slightly got it, but if she had a dirtier mind, she was sure that she would have laughed as well.

Didn't Jackson have a dirty mind, since he was a guy? But if he had, then wouldn't he have…you know…_done_ something already?

"Leese," Jackson said, snapping her out of her consuming thoughts.

Lisa looked up at him, looking startled. "Oh," she said. She nodded and took the chopsticks and broke them apart, before opening the box and being overwhelmed by hunger. Her mouth watered and she licked her lips as she picked up a piece of chicken from inside the box with her chopsticks and plopped it in her mouth. Lisa closed her eyes in pure bliss. When Lisa was done chewing, she opened her eyes, to see that Jackson was looking at her with an amused expression.

So, she did what any respectable, professional, adult woman would do in her position: Lisa Reisert stuck her tongue out at Jackson Rippner before plopping another piece of chicken in her mouth.

Jackson chuckled. "Very mature, Leese," he said, going back to his own food, "_very_ mature."

Lisa gave a small smile as she turned back to her box of chicken, quickly wiping it away so that he wouldn't see it.

She reached into the bag and pulled out another box, opening it to find white rice. That would go good with the chicken. Lisa silently thanked Jackson in her head for thinking to order food. She loved Chinese food. But, of course, he would know, Lisa realized with a tightening in her stomach, as if someone had squeezed it in their hand. Jackson knew everything about her—well, almost everything. He hadn't known that she had had an…unfortunate encounter two years back, but he did now, thanks to her stupid mouth. He knew every last detail about her, and she knew nothing about him. It made her feel…inadequate, almost, next to him—beneath him. Lisa didn't like the feeling, not one bit.

"Lisa, are you okay?"

Lisa turned to look at Jackson before quickly looking away.

_Why do you care?_ She asked in her mind. _Oh, that's right, you don't. You just need me to be alright for when you use me again to get what you want._

"I'm fine," Lisa murmured before going back to eating, mulling everything over in her mind. She just _had_ to find a way to escape and get to the nearest police station—then, and only then, would she be safe.

She'd be able to attack Jackson—maybe poke out an eye with one of her chopsticks—from here, but then what? She was attached to the chair—she wasn't going anywhere, not without the key, at least. But she hadn't looked to see where Jackson had placed the key after he had unlocked her. Lisa mentally kicked herself. How could she have been so stupid as to not have looked to see where he placed the darn key? And she didn't know where she was, or where the nearest police station was.

If only she could get hold of a gun—she was a much better shot than Jackson. She could get him to let her go if she held a gun in his face. But her spirits deflated. Where on Earth would she get a gun, without Jackson noticing or stopping her?

This seemed even more hopeless than on the plane.

She'd just have to wait until an opportunity presented itself, Lisa decided. And until then, she'd just have to play along—but nobody ever said anything about being a good little girl about it.

As soon as both Jackson and Lisa were done eating, Jackson stood up and undid the handcuffs around her ankles, before taking the handcuffs in his right hand and yanking her up by his left hand, dragging her toward the bed again.

"Wait," Lisa said, dragging her heels and pulling Jackson to a stop. "I have to go to the restroom."

Jackson turned around and looked at her from head to toe and back again. He wondered what she was playing at as his eyes narrowed.

"Fine," he said through tight lips, "but there's no way you can escape. There are no windows in the bathroom, nothing that can be used as a potentially harmful weapon, and if you write something on the mirror again, I'm the only one who's going to see it. Still want to go?"

Lisa nodded her head weakly, her muscles clenched.

Jackson pulled Lisa over to the bathroom harshly and threw her in, closing the door. "You have ten minutes." He told her as he stood on the other side of the door.

Lisa took a deep breath. After doing the necessary business and washing her hands, she turned to look at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were crusted over with smudged make-up that she had put on before she had been kidnapped, dry mascara and eye-liner lines ran down her face from when she had cried. Her hair was in knots and disarray and she had dried blood on her lips from more than one occasion.

She sighed as she turned the faucet on and leaned over the sink, splashing water on her face and scrubbing away at the make-up with her hands. When she was done and had dried her face with a towel she had found hanging in front of the shower—obliviously forgetting that it was the one that Jackson had used to dry off with after his shower earlier—she inspected herself in the mirror again. Her face was red and raw, her eyes puffy from both the crying she had done a little while ago and how hard she had scrubbed to get the eye-make-up off.

Lisa didn't have a brush, so she used her fingers, running them through her hair like a comb. The end result was nearly as good as it would be if she had used a brush, but at least it was better than it had been before.

She heard a banging at the door as she splashed cold water on her face again, trying to liven herself up. Sure, it was only Jackson, and she shouldn't care what he thought of her appearance—and no one could be expected to look good after what she had been through recently—but he was still a _guy_, and an _extremely attractive_ guy at that. It was her natural instinct to try and make herself look good, even if it _was_ Jackson.

"Time's up." Lisa heard Jackson say from the other side of the door.

Lisa looked at herself in the mirror one last time before opening the door and nearly walking right into Jackson, he was standing so close.

Lisa took a step back and looked up at him. "Ever heard of personal space?"

Jackson didn't answer her and instead looked around the bathroom, making sure that everything was where it should be. Once he had decided that it was; he grabbed her by the wrist and drug her over to the bed, flinging her onto it.

Lisa bounced a little on the bed, her butt still sore from when she had been flung harshly into the back of the car some time ago.

"Jeeze," Lisa said, wincing. "You _could_ be a little gentler, you know. I'm not indestructible."

Jackson ignored her again and got to work handcuffing her to the bed.

"Ouch," Lisa said as the handcuffs scraped against her right wrist as he was putting it on. "You know, I know that I'm only another job to you again, but you could at least _try _and not hurt me so much. I know that it would be difficult for someone like you, but if you keep this up, I'm not going to be much use to you for whatever you want me for."

"Stop complaining," he said shortly as he finished up.

Lisa glared at him as he walked over to the eating table and cleared it off, throwing the empty take-out boxes in the trash can. He brushed his hands together afterwards and turned back to look at Lisa, who quickly looked away so that he wouldn't know that she had been watching him. She had a feeling though that he knew anyways, though. Because, really, he was a trained assassin—or assassin manager, same thing, basically—so she would be surprised if he didn't have highly trained senses. She was pretty sure that he was a light sleeper, as well.

Lisa saw the digital clock again when she turned her head. Eight twenty-six the blinking red numbers read. Wow. She was surprised by how quickly time had gone by.

A shift in the bed caught Lisa's attention and her head whipped to her right to see that Jackson was lying down beside her, his hands placed comfortably behind his head as he half-sat up with his legs stretched out in front of him, his shoes off and his toes wiggling in freedom, a small TV on the other side of the room on and the remote sitting on the bed in between Jackson and her.

Lisa swore that her jaw was hitting the bed to her right when she saw him. He just looked so…comfortable, so…_not_ Jackson Rippner like, so unguarded and normal.

But, as Lisa chastised herself, he was a really good actor, after all. Either that; or he was just a regular normal guy outside of work. She wanted to believe the latter of the two more than the first one, even though that one seemed the most reasonable and logical explanation for why he was lying beside her so relaxed and watching the television.

Jackson took one hand from behind his head and grabbed the remote, changing the channel. He flipped through a few, before finally finding something that he was interested in watching. Lisa turned back to look at the TV to see that it was the news.

A woman in a navy blue skirt-suit sitting behind a desk with a white blouse on underneath the blazer was talking about George Foreman, a picture of the recently deceased businessman next to her on the screen. Lisa snuck a glance at Jackson from the corner of her eye to see that he had a small smirk on his face. So he _had_ had something to do with the young and rich bachelor's death, just as Detective Forbes had suspected. Jackson seemed rather proud as he watched the news woman continue to talk about what a tragedy that the death was, and how much he would be missed, and how, although the culprit had yet to be caught, the police were working diligently on the case.

Lisa looked back at the screen before saying, "I thought that you only did government overthrows and political assassinations." She had recalled him saying that on the flight two months ago, back when she still thought that he was kidding about his profession.

Jackson seemed hesitant in answering, because he was silent for a little bit, and Lisa turned her head to look at him. Either he was hesitant, or he was deciding on the right way to word what he was going to say.

"I do those, but I do other things as well." He said slowly, still watching the screen, both of his hands still separating his head from the metal headboard's bars—two of which were helping trap her on the bed. "It really depends on who the client wants to have…_dealt with_. It just so happens that George Foreman had many enemies, one in particular that would go so far as to hire assassins to give Foreman what he probably had coming to him for a good while."

"So what professions of people that have been killed by you or your company have there been so far, other than businessmen and political figures?" Lisa asked, trying to hide the curiosity from her voice, but not being very effective in the act.

Jackson looked over at Lisa sharply out of the corner of his eye before turning to look back at the screen. "You know that that's none of your business, Leese."

"What?" Lisa asked with a snort. "You think I'm going to go running and telling people? I'm not stupid." She paused here. "I know that after the job this time, you won't repeat the same mistake you made last time. I know that I won't be walking away from this at the end if things go the way you want them to."

Jackson looked over at her, slightly speechless, his lips parted a little. He inspected her with his eyes a little bit before they settled on her face, staring at her eyes and every little detail on her face—including her plump lips—although she didn't notice.

"I'm right, aren't I, Jack?"

Jackson saw her lips move as she spoke. His eyes darted back up to her eyes—she was still watching the TV, and her eyes were blank. He could tell that she was trying very hard to keep all emotion out of her voice and face. Jackson's mouth closed into a firm line and he turned back to face the television, not answering. In all honesty, he wasn't really sure yet what he was going to do once the job was over.

Lisa took his silence as a yes.

Her head jerked sharply to her left so that Jackson wouldn't see the tears building up behind her eyes and her bottom lip tremble slightly. He had already seen her in too many weak moments—she wasn't about to go and give him another just like that, when he hadn't even used physical force or hurtful or threatening words.

She had been afraid that, if all things went according to Jackson's plans, then she wouldn't be alive after everything was done. He was an intelligent man—he wasn't about to let something like what happened after the Red Eye flight happen again. And Lisa wasn't dumb enough or hopeful or naïve enough to falsely think that he would let her live, and that she would walk away unscathed.

Lisa knew that last time she had been lucky—e_xtremely_ lucky—and she doubted that she would have such good luck again this time as to get away alive. After all, being in the profession that Jackson was, one had to be unforgiving and cruel—how else would they get the job of someone who helps kill people or _does_ actually physically kill people. There were no wimps in the mafia, or wussies in gangs. You had to have real guts—and a lack of compassion and most emotion—to kill or deal with the killing of people.

Jackson's behavior since she had first known of his true intentions had proven that. And it kept on proving that, even up to that very moment.

And that was why Lisa had to find a way to escape. She had to find the opportune moment to get away, sometime before the job reached its end, preferably. However, Lisa wouldn't be picky. If she had the chance, she would take it, no matter what. At least this time Jackson didn't have a man with a twelve-inch K-Bar outside her dad's house—mainly because there were probably police officers there with her dad to make sure that no harm came to him. Lisa imagined that there would be police officers searching for her by now as well, seeing as how she was the object of Jackson's job last time as well, so why wouldn't she be again? Not to mention that he'd most undoubtedly want revenge.

"And now, to wrap up the nightly news, we leave you with a missing person report. Lisa Reisert—" Lisa snapped her head forward so fast that she felt a warm pain in her neck, but what the woman on the news was saying was too shocking that she didn't even notice the pain as her eyes widened and her lips parted, "—is the hotel manager of the Miami Lux Atlantic, the same hotel that just two months earlier was attacked with the intentions of Charles Keefe—the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security—to be assassinated. Joe Reisert, Lisa Reisert's father, suspects that it may be a mysterious man named Jared Rider, who had blackmailed Lisa two months ago to try and help him assassinate Charles Keefe, who has kidnapped Lisa this time. Stay tuned for more information on tomorrow's segment."

Jackson turned the TV off with the remote. Lisa was still dumbstruck at her photo being up on the television screen, and at being talked about on the news. But she wasn't dumbstruck enough to miss the name change.

Lisa's jaw clenched. She turned to Jackson and glared at him. "_Jared Rider?_" she asked through gritted teeth.

Jackson looked at her and smirked. "You didn't actually think that _any_ person of the media would seriously get a hold of my real name, did you?"

"But how did you—"

"Scrambler," Jackson replied before turning to look ahead of him. "They intercept the real message and 'scramble' it so that a member of the company doesn't get their real information on the media. It's saved quite a lot of necks before, because it has the public and the police looking for the wrong guy."

"My dad will correct that as soon as he sees it." Lisa told him confidently.

Jackson looked at Lisa sharply and spat, "You didn't tell your precious _daddy_ enough about me for him to remember my exact name. All he knows for absolute certain is that my initials are the same as his. You're doing exactly what you did after that parking lot incident," here Lisa visibly flinched and Jackson's voice, having seen this, lessened in venom when he continued, "you're locking it all up inside, not letting anybody really know every last detail. And those are the important details that could have helped to catch the criminal."

"You've forgotten about Detective Forbes." I told him. "And the people at the police department, and the lawyers, you're leaving out a lot of people who know your name." Lisa told him pointedly. "And my dad wouldn't have begun to forget your name—not in a million years, no matter how little I told him about the event."

"All those people have been dealt with accordingly. As memory erasing is yet to be perfected, I can't do anything about your dad, since he's being swarmed by police officers, but everyone else won't be saying a word." Jackson said carelessly, no sorrow or guilt or resent marring his face or voice.

Lisa's eyes widened. Detective Forbes, who she had just seen not all that long ago—she couldn't imagine him dead, just like that.

"You'll be caught, _Jack._" Lisa told him matter-of-factly. "You won't get away with all this."

Jackson glanced at her sharply before standing up and stretching. "Watch me."

"Oh, I'll be watching alright." Lisa said. "I'll be watching you as you fail."

Jackson pierced her with a cold glare briefly before pulling back the covers to Lisa's right.

Her eyes widened accordingly. "What are you doing?"

"What does it look like?" he asked, annoyance evident in his voice.

He walked over to his bag and took out what looked like a wad of clothing and walked into the bathroom, closing the door behind himself. He was out in what didn't even seem like a minute to Lisa. Her eyes practically bulged out of her head as she saw what he was wearing. Jackson was dressed in a long black T-shirt that fell down to his waist, and a pair of black and white striped boxers. He flicked off the light switch, which made the room dark except for the small lamp that was turned on beside the bed on the little nightstand.

"You can't be _serious._" Lisa said incredulously, her mouth suddenly dry and her hands getting clammy.

"Do I seem like someone who would kid around with you, Leese?" Jackson asked as he walked over to the bed. He climbed under the covers and puffed up his pillow before setting it behind his head.

"But you can't sleep here!" She protested.

"Oh?" he turned to her face her curiously, "And why not?"

"Because I'm here!" she said, as if it were the most obvious reason in the world as to why he should not be settling down.

"Your point?" asked Jackson, not really caring.

"It's improper!" she practically shrieked.

Jackson rolled his eyes. "Well I'm not about to go sleeping on the floor—and who knows what's been on that couch before we got this room. Just suck it up. I'm sleeping in this bed whether you like it or not."

After getting comfortable, Jackson reached over and turned off the light, basking the entire room in utter darkness.

"Jackson," Lisa murmured.

"What?" his voice sounded annoyed.

"I can't sleep like this."

"Do you really think that I care?" he asked rudely. He just wanted to get to sleep and get this day done and over with.

"Fine," Lisa said quietly, glaring at the darkness ahead of her, "I'll just keep talking and keep you up _all night long._"

Jackson growled before reaching out to the lamp and turning it on roughly. Once light illuminated the room barely once again, he turned over on his side and glared at her, and Lisa glared right on back.

Jackson reluctantly slid out of the covers, kneeling on the bed, and crawled over, swung his leg over Lisa, and straddled her waist as he leant over and took the key out of a pocket in his boxers, unlocking her handcuffs from her wrists and the headboard. He put the key back in his pocket, and this time Lisa made sure to know where he kept it.

Although, she could barely think about where Jackson was putting some key, because, nothing in the entire world could have distracted her from having a small heart attack.

_Jackson Rippner_ was straddling her waist and leaning over her. And Lisa felt like she might die at any given second from her lack of taking in oxygen. But, honestly, who could possibly even _think_ of blaming her when this unbelievably _gorgeous_, and unbelievably bad and dangerous—not to mention completely off-limits—man was s_traddling_ them and leaning over them? He was so close that Lisa could smell his natural musky scent mixed in with a very, very light cologne.

Jackson threw both of the handcuffs onto the bed beside them and gazed down at Lisa's face, his large hands covering her small ones and trapping them on the headboard. Lisa's eyes widened in fear and anxiety as he stared down into them and she was sure that, if this continued for any longer, she was going to start hyperventilating.

Jackson's hands slid down a little until he wrapped them restricting around her wrists and swung his leg off of her, standing and pulling her to her feet. He used more force than necessary, and so Lisa went flying into his chest and stumbling back a little. Her cheeks were painted a crimson red. Jackson just chuckled lightly for a second before pulling her over to his side of the bed and—letting go of her right wrist—picking up a handcuff. He looked like he was about to put it back on her left wrist.

Lisa—seeing what he was about to do—tried to jerk her wrist out of his steel-like grip, but to no avail, of course. "Wait, what are you doing?" she asked, panic starting to seep in.

Jackson sighed in annoyance and looked at her with bored eyes. "I'm going to handcuff you to me so that way you won't be able to get away in the night, and then we are going to go to sleep."

"But—" she had to think up an excuse—_anything_—to prolong the inevitable. Thinking quickly, she continued, "I can't sleep in these clothes! And I haven't taken a shower since before you kidnapped me. You could at least let me take a shower and change into something else before connecting me to you."

"There are no girl clothes anywhere in this room." Jackson said suspiciously.

"They don't have to be girl clothes, just anything, really. I want to get out of these clothes." She gestured to what she was wearing with her right hand.

Jackson inspected her shortly before throwing the handcuff back down on the bed, clinging loudly as it hit the other one already on the bed. He dragged her over to his bag, where he pulled out another small bundle of clothes and thrust them into her arms before pushing her into the bathroom harshly and closing the door behind her.

Lisa sighed and looked in the mirror at her reflection before looking down at the clothes he had given her and inspected them.

If her cheeks could have been any redder, they would have been. Did Jackson realize that he had handed her a white T-shirt—exactly identical to the black one he was wearing except for the color—and ocean-blue silk boxers? No, he couldn't have. But, then again, he _had_ said that there were no girl clothes at all anywhere in the room, and she _had_ said she'd wear anything, as long as she could get out of what she was currently wearing.

Lisa slipped out of her clothes—after making sure to lock the door—and turned the shower on, hot water running through. She climbed in and washed herself with the soap and shampoo that were provided by the motel. The hot water was calming on her tense muscles and the feeling of getting clean was soothing. She turned off the knob reluctantly and sighed when the water disappeared, her eyes closing.

Opening them again, Lisa rung out her hair and grabbed the towel hanging outside the shower, drying her body and her hair off with it.

When she was dry, Lisa hesitantly and slowly slid on the ones that Jackson had given her. She kept her panties and bra on—for obvious reasons. When she was done, she looked at herself in the mirror and decided that, against her better judgment, she actually looked decent in Jackson's…clothes.

Lisa ran her hands through her wet hair several times since she had no comb or brush. She rinsed her mouth out with water before checking herself in the mirror one more time.

She took a deep breath. Sooner or later she would have to leave this bathroom, and Jackson would be in a better mood if she left it sooner, which meant that he might not be quite as rough as he would be if she left it later.

Lisa held her breath as she turned the doorknob—the lock unlocking itself—and opened the door.

Jackson was waiting right outside the door with a pair of handcuffs ready. Without hesitation, he reached out and grabbed her right wrist and cuffed it to his left one. Lisa flinched as she felt the cold metal against her skin again—and also because she was now bound to Jackson, which meant that escape was less than zero percent—it was way down low in the negatives.

Jackson dragged her back to the side of the bed which he had claimed as his. On the way over, Lisa tossed her wadded-up clothes into a corner of the room.

Jackson stopped in front of the bed and turned to look at her, his eyes roaming her body. Lisa fidgeted under his gaze and muttered, "Please, don't." It made her feel unbearably uncomfortable when he would do that—especially in what little she was wearing, and considering that what she _was_ wearing was _his_.

And just like that, Jackson turned back to the bed, and climbed onto it, pulling on his left hand indicating that Lisa should do the same.

Lisa complied and kneeled on the bed, crawling over to her side, pulling down the covers, and plopping down under them, her head resting comfortably on a pillow. She watched as Jackson got under the covers as well.

Jackson sighed and turned the lamp off one more time before shifting until he was comfortable.

Lisa gazed into the darkness above her head. There was complete silence for a few minutes. Lisa heard Jackson's steady breathing.

"Jackson?" she whispered quietly.

"What _now_?"

She paused. "Thanks," she whispered so quietly that she wasn't sure if he heard her or not. He didn't respond. She wasn't really sure quite what she was thanking him for—for letting her take a shower and wear clean clothes, even if they _were_ his, or for allowing her to sleep semi-comfortably. Granted—although this was a lot more comfortable than the last position that she had been in for quite some time—her right hand felt restricted since it was the one chained to his left hand.

She felt doomed thinking about how she was attached to him.

Lisa squeezed her eyes shut. No, she wouldn't think about this. She was going to try and get some sleep, because tomorrow was sure to be even worse than today.

She let out a small sigh before sleep overcame her completely.

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**Okay, so, I want to thank all of you who have reviewed so far--your reviews mean a lot to me! No flashback dreams this chapter. Do you guys like those? (I'm just asking your opinion because, even if you don't like them, I'm still going to continue putting them. I just felt like I should ask your opinion.) **

**What did you guys think? I'm trying hard to keep both Jackson and Lisa in character, but I'm sure as anyone will agree, it's hard keeping ANY character from ANYTHING in character, so I'm trying my best, and if someone is a little OOC for a little bit, then cut me some slack.**

**What did you think of the longer chapter? I thought about stopping it LONG ago, but then I thought: "Nah, why not give them all something a little extra?" And so there ya go.**

**I seriously love you ALL and please don't forget to review this chapter. Hope you liked it.**

**Yours happily,**

**MidnightThief15 XD**


	5. Awkward Positions and Failed Escapes

**Voila. Chapter 5. I definitely am more inspired and have less writer's block for this story than I am with the others I'm working on. Two chapter in the same month. That's good for me--trust me. :D So, please enjoy chapter 5. (Oh, and for all you Jackson x Lisa pairing fans out there reading this, I threw in a little something for you all in the beginning of this chapter.) ;)**

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**Chapter Five: Awkward Positions and Failed Escapes**

Lisa groaned as sunlight attempted to penetrate through her eyelids. She squeezed them shut even more, snuggling even closer to a hard, yet not uncomfortable substance. She gave a light, contented sigh as she felt herself move up and down in a rhythmic pattern. There was an unknown weight pressing down on her lower back, about right where the boxers started, but she didn't mind. It felt right, and comfortable. She gave a small smile as she squeezed the hand she was holding lightly.

Wait a second.

Lisa's eyes snapped open—wide and awake. She assessed her situation without moving a single muscle.

Slowly, ever so slowly and carefully, she lifted her head and looked up. Her breath caught in her throat when she was met with Jackson's face, only inches away.

She forced herself to calm down and breathe again. It was obviously that he was sleeping—his eyes were closed and he was still breathing rhythmically. His head was turned to the side, so she got a profile of his face. He actually looked quite…peaceful when he was a sleep. He didn't look threatening, or serious.

Okay, so, she had to be extremely cautious so as not to wake up Jackson and alert him that she was awake. No problem…right? Lisa stopped herself from hyperventilating. Now was definitely not the time.

She looked around once she deemed it semi-safe. That hard, yet not uncomfortable substance turned out to be Jackson's black-covered chest, and it turned out that she was strewn all over it, shamelessly. She instantly felt her cheeks go red hot, especially when she looked to her right and saw that her right hand was intertwined with Jackson's left one, both of their wrists connected with handcuffs.

The covers were at her waste, so she could see their hands clearly. She quickly—and carefully, of course—looked around for her other hand, hoping that it wasn't where it shouldn't be. She found it clutching onto Jackson's firm right shoulder.

Lisa also realized that that unknown weight pressing down over her back was his right arm wrapped around her waist, just above her butt. Lisa's breath caught in her throat even more. If it had been just a little bit lower…Lisa repressed a shiver.

Lisa lightly laid her head back down on Jackson's cloth-covered chest—even though he had a T-shirt on, she could still feel his firm and sculpted muscles underneath. It made him seem even more deadly to her. She had to think about this rationally without waking Jackson. No sudden movements were the best thing to go by right now. She was sure that he was probably on the brink of waking up as it was, since she was positive that he was probably a rather light sleeper.

Lisa could have laughed in glee. It came to her! She didn't know why she didn't think of it before—maybe because she was still getting over the shock of it all—but she came up with the perfect—at least it seemed that way to her at the time—plan to get away.

She hesitantly—and gently—removed her left hand from Jackson's shoulder and slowly moved it through the air, so that she didn't touch him anywhere and disturb his sleep accidentally. She lightly set it down when she reached his waist and felt the end of his T-shirt and the fabric of his boxers.

Lisa squeezed her eyes together tightly. She couldn't believe that she was about to do this. She slowly moved her hand down the side of his boxers, into his pocket, and felt around for the key to their handcuffs.

Lisa smiled slightly when she felt the key. She wrapped her fingers around it tightly and began to pull it out of the pocket when she felt Jackson stir underneath her.

_Crap, crap, crap, crap, CRAP. _She thought in distress as she quickly withdrew her hand from Jackson's pocket and placed it back on his shoulder, stretching herself out even more over Jackson's body, placing her left leg in between his two. She tried to relax so that he wouldn't be able to tell that she was awake. She remembered to breathe finally, although they were shaky breaths. Lisa cursed her lungs. _This can't be happening. Please, PLEASE don't wake up Jackson. Don't wake up. DON'T WAKE UP!_

Lisa felt the arm around her waist retract. _Crap. You woke up. What are you doing, I wonder? _

Suddenly, Lisa felt warm fingers brush a strand of hair that had fallen down over her face to the side, out of her face.

Jackson's fingers spent a second or two more at the side of her face, on top of that strand of hair he had pushed out of her face, cupping her cheek, before his fingers moved down tauntingly over her skin before settling at her neck. They cupped the back of her neck. It seemed gentle enough, but that didn't stop Lisa from tensing her entire body is anticipation. He was going to kill her. Of course he was. His hand was _right_ at the back of her neck. Like this she was absolutely defenseless. Panic swept over Lisa quickly.

Jackson squeezed Lisa's right hand a bit. Suddenly, and without warning, Jackson's chest began to shake underneath Lisa.

Was he…_laughing?_

Jackson's right hand moved down from Lisa's neck and ran down her back, sending tingles up and down Lisa's spine. She was sure that Jackson had felt them. He reached to hem of the shirt that she was wearing—it was so long, it was practically like a mini-dress, reaching only a few inches above the end of the boxers she was wearing—and too hold of the bottom of the shirt. He then started slowly—agonizingly—pulling it up.

If Lisa thought that she had felt panic before, that was _nothing_ compared to what she was feeling now. Her breath caught in her throat. What was he _doing?!_

Jackson's fingers brushed the skin of Lisa's back as he continued to pull the shirt up. Higher and higher. Maybe he _wasn't_ better than your average criminal—he was still a man, after all. And, as it was turning out, wasn't much better than the average rapist, even if he was being gentle. He was still doing it while he thought she was sleep. That was just so wrong.

Lisa couldn't do anything, though. She was at the complete mercy of Jackson. She had to continue playing asleep. All that she could do was hope with every fiber of her being that he would stop before he reached her bra.

Lisa's shirt was raised just below her bra now. Lisa could have cried. How could he do this? She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream at him to stop and smack him as hard as she could. She tensed every muscle in her body, waiting for the inevitable.

And then, just like that, Jackson stopped, and pulled her shirt back down. His chest was shaking again in what Lisa assumed was laughter. But she didn't care. She was just glad that he had had enough decency to stop.

"Leese," she felt warm breath on her face as she heard his husky voice. Maybe he always sounded husky after just waking up? Lisa hoped against all odds that that was indeed the case.

Lisa inwardly grimaced and her hand tightened around his unconsciously. He knew that she was awake. But, then again, who wouldn't be after _that?_

"I know that you're awake. Open your eyes."

Even though Lisa hated following Jackson's orders, she opened her eyes anyways, dreading meeting his eyes.

It was then that Lisa realized how close to face really was to Jackson. She hadn't quite noticed it before since his head was turned away from her. But now he was facing her, and she realized that her head was more to the right than directly beneath his head, so she was staring at him now, her head still lying on his chest.

"What are you doing, Leese?" Jackson asked, and he sounded almost…resigned, in a way.

Lisa was taken by surprise. Her eyes widened, but as quickly as the surprise had come, it had vanished and was replaced by anger and frustration, her eyes narrowing.

"_Me?_ What am _I _doing?" She said angrily, staring up into his crystal blue eyes. Did he know that his eyes were very clear and piercing when he first woke up? "I think the better question is what do you think _you're_ doing?!"

Jackson shrugged and Lisa lifted her head off of his chest to glare at him. "I was just testing you; to see how much you would endure before you decided to stop playing possum and show that you were awake. Considering your past, you can endure quite a bit if it means that the other person won't even know that you're awake." He chuckled with a smirk.

Lisa glared at him even harder and moved her left hand away from his shoulder and down to his chest, using it to push away from him. She soon found out that it was useless, though, because it seemed that his arm had found its way back around her waist, and was locked there, unmovable. Stupid assassin and his stupid strength.

"Let me go." Lisa said through gritted teeth.

"Why in such a rush?" Jackson asked her with a smirk. "I'll have you know that _you_ were the one who moved into this position during your sleep—all by yourself. I have nothing to do with you lying here right now."

Lisa felt her cheeks go red hot. "Oh yeah?" she asked with a glare. "And I suppose it was my fault as well that your arm trapped me to you when I woke up?"

"You were shivering in your sleep. I couldn't very well sleep with you shivering on top of me, so I put my arm around your waist to get you to stop, which you did, so it turns out that it worked." Jackson told her matter-of-factly.

"And _why_ exactly did you allow me to stay in this position then?!" She asked, furious. "You should have pushed me aside roughly, not caring about me."

"You were having a nightmare." Jackson told her. Lisa's face went blank and her mouth hung open a little. "You stopped whimpering when you got into this position, so I didn't push you off."

"I don't remember any nightmare." Lisa told him, shocked.

"Well, I do." Jackson told her. "You kept muttering in your sleep. You kept saying over and over again, 'Get away. Leave me alone. Please, stop, don't.'"

Before Lisa knew what she was doing, she slapped him across the face with her left hand, hard. His head turned to the side and stayed there. She was surprised that he didn't turn back to her in rage and beat her, strangle her, anything. He didn't even stop her slap, even though she knew that he probably could have. He didn't do anything, instead letting her hit him.

She didn't care, though. Unshed tears blurred her vision and she glared at him with all the hatred she could muster, which was quite a lot at the moment.

"Let me go." Lisa muttered menacingly and was heavily relieved when Jackson's arm released her from his hold over her. She rolled over and off of his chest, lying on her side of the bed now. Her hand released Jacksons and she turned her head away from him, tears prickling her eyes and threatening to spill over.

She had been dreaming about that day in the parking lot two years ago, and she hadn't even remembered it. And what's worse was that she knew that Jackson knew _exactly_ what her nightmare was about. Stupid her and her big mouth telling him. Of course, that had been when she had thought that either he was going to kill her or that she would never see him again. And, of course, both of those had been wrong.

"Lisa—"

"We're leaving today, right?" Lisa asked Jackson roughly, cutting him off in what he was about to say.

"Yes, we are." Jackson said calmly from behind her.

"Good," Lisa said shortly.

Lisa sat up and yanked on her right hand, the effect causing Jackson's left hand to be pulled up a little bit into the air. "I want to go to the restroom."

She was surprised when Jackson didn't say anything, didn't protest or ask why or glare or look suspiciously at her or anything. He just sat up, dug out his key, and placed it in the lock, releasing both of their hands.

As soon as Lisa's wrist was free, she jumped up off of the bed and ran to the bathroom, slamming the door behind her and locking it. Lisa let out a breath and rested her forehead against the door, clutching the handle of the door. She quickly spun around until her back was pressed against it and looked around the bathroom.

She had to come up with a plan. She couldn't stay another minute in Jackson's presence. If she did, she knew she wouldn't live long after his job or whatever was completed. Besides, he wouldn't kill her before it was over. He had gone out of his way to kidnap her; he must need her for something, which meant that she was semi-safe, since she'd probably be worthless to him dead—which meant that if she tried to escape and failed, then at least she knew he wouldn't kill her just yet. That wasn't as comforting a thought as she hoped it would be, though.

Lisa looked around hastily. There had to be something she could use as a weapon. She didn't even care if she managed to escape and had to run around barefoot only wearing Jackson's boxers and a shirt way too big for her. One way or another, she would get out of his grasp.

Lisa stared at the mirror. She shouldn't, really she shouldn't. It would hurt her too much, and then it would be useless to try and hurt Jackson because she would be in too much pain. Her plan would undoubtedly fail.

She turned to look at the door. But then again, she didn't really have many options, did she?

Turning back to the mirror, Lisa took a deep breath. This was it. It was now or never.

Lisa scrunched up her face in anticipation of the pain, drew her right arm back, forming a fist with her hand, and then swung her arm forward, smashing it into the mirror with everything that she had. The mirror shattered around her fist, shards flying everywhere, scraping her bare arms and legs and face.

Lisa yelped out in excruciating pain. Biting her lip, tears fell down her cheeks harshly and as powerfully as a waterfall. She looked at the door. He was probably standing right outside, and he was sure to have heard both the shattering of the glass and her yelp.

Lisa wasted no time in falling to the floor on her knees, getting glass embedded into her legs, and searched through the shard with already bloody hands. The knuckles on her right hand were positively atrocious.

"Lisa?" came Jackson's voice from the other side of the door, and Lisa could clearly detect panic and worry in it. "Lisa, what's going on? What happened?"

Lisa didn't answer him as she continued to sort through the shards as quick as she could, as if her life depended on it—which, it probably most likely did.

Ahah!

Lisa held up a large shard—larger than the others that had fallen—and grinned to herself, her own pain forgotten.

"Lisa?!"

Lisa looked up.

"Lisa, I'm coming in."

Since when did Jackson have the courtesy to say stuff like that? Wouldn't he just go straight into the breaking-down-the-door action? Maybe he felt bad for having upset her only moments ago… Wait, what was she thinking? _Jackson_…feeling _bad_? Hah, that was a laugh!

Lisa heard a pound on the door and quickly stood up and backed away against the opposite wall. He was trying to break the door down, probably with his foot. She doubted he would inflict damage on himself enough to tackle the door open—not for her, at least.

Another bang.

Lisa hastily looked around her. She had to find a place to hide the shard until the opportune moment when she could strike Jackson with it. But where? Where would the large, pointed shard be concealed enough so that Jackson wouldn't see it and wouldn't see her reaching for it when it was time? She thought about putting it in between her skin and the waistband at the back of the boxers she was wearing, but that would hurt a lot.

She looked around. It seemed like she didn't have any other option. She would have to do that. Besides, she was already in pain and a mess. What were a few scratches on her back gonna do?

Lisa reluctantly lifted her shirt up and placed the shard against the skin of her back, letting the waistband of the boxers secure it there tightly. It dug in a little, but she would live. And at least it would be out of Jackson's sight and safe.

One more bang. Except, this time, the door flew open, attached by only a hinge or two to the frame. Jackson stood there, his hair everywhere, a wild look on his face, a concerned look in his eyes.

Lisa watched his eyes as they widened, viewing the mirror, then the glass on the floor, pooled lightly in blood, and then up to her hands, her left hand cradling her bloodied right one. He looked at the glass embedded in her legs, the scratches and scrapes and cuts all over her exposed flesh. There were even some tears in the clothes she was wearing, signs that the skin hidden behind cloth was cut as well.

Jackson's eyes traveled up to Lisa's watery ones. She had been crying even before she had threw the punch toward the mirror, and the tears were coming so fast and so hard now, yet she wasn't making a single sound, nor did her shoulders shake. But the tears kept on coming. Her face was scrunched up in pain, and she looked like she was going to sob out loud at any second.

"Oh, Leese," Jackson said slowly, concerned, confused how she could do this—to herself, no less. She was a wreck, and not just physically.

Jackson cautiously stepped over the glass, his feet protected by shoes. He walked toward her slowly, making sure that she didn't do anything in her crazed state that either of them were going to regret later.

"Leese, why?"

And Lisa knew that she couldn't do it. She just couldn't. She thought she could before, but now, she just knew that she couldn't. Not after looking at Jackson's face, not after hearing his voice—not after looking into his crystal eyes. He was caring about her. _Jackson Rippner_ was caring about _her_. He wasn't supposed to be caring or concerned or worried right now, he was supposed to be angry, suspicious that she was planning on hurting him. He should be worrying about himself right now, not her and her pain.

Lisa shook her head at him and she gasped in air loudly. Her left hand flew to her mouth as her shoulders began to shake.

Her head was screaming at her to do it, that he didn't really care about her, he just cared about her health because if she was hurt too badly then she wouldn't be able to help him in his job. He was just an actor—a very, very good actor. He didn't really care. She should do it. Her mind was screaming that it was the only way. She had to do it.

Lisa continued to shake her head at him, her mouth still covered by her hand, her eyes wide. _Don't,_ she plead in her mind, watching Jackson in horror, _don't come any closer. Stop. Stop and turn around. Leave. Please…leave. Don't make me do this. Please, please don't make me do this. I don't want to do this. Please, realize what's going to happen and leave._

A loud sob escaped from Lisa's lips and her shoulders shook roughly.

"Leese," Jackson said as he reached her.

"No," her voice cracked as she tried to warn him without telling him. She couldn't do this, even if she had stabbed Jackson in the throat with a pen months ago, she couldn't do this now. Why couldn't she? She didn't even know. Maybe it was because she was seeing a different side of Jackson now. She wasn't seeing menacing, threatening Jackson right now. No, she was seeing caring, concerned, worried Jackson—worrying about her.

"Wha—" Jackson began to say, a confused look on his face. He didn't get the chance to finish.

Lisa's body betrayed her and sided with her mind. She drew the shard quickly from the waistband and flung at Jackson, catching him off guard.

She stabbed the shard in his shoulder, wedging it in deeply before fleeing through the bathroom toward the front door of their motel room. It was too late to go back now. She didn't care as her bare feet ran over the shards of glass.

Lisa reached the front door. Well, _crashed into_ was more correct. She fumbled with the doorknob, but it wouldn't open. Why the freak wouldn't it open? Didn't it know what a hurry she was in? Didn't know that it was pretty much practically the only thing standing in between life and death for her? Why the heck wouldn't the stupid door _open_?!

Oh. It was locked. Duh! Lisa felt like slapping herself, but she had no time for that. She quickly turned the lock with shaking hands and opened the door. But, unluckily for her, just as she was running out of the open door, a hand grasped her right wrist and yanked her back, the door slamming shut and locking again.

"No!" Lisa screamed.

She was swung around to face one angry looking Jackson. Actually, he was livid. He had pulled the shard out of his shoulder and blood was running down his arm now.

Lisa struggled and pushed against his chest, trying to get away from him. She started pounding against his chest with fists. "Let me _go!"_

Jackson backhanded her in anger and Lisa fell down onto the hard carpet of the floor with a cry of pain. She looked up at him, looking into his eyes. She glared hatefully at him.

Jackson walked toward her and grabbed her hair, lifting her head off of the floor.

Lisa kicked at his legs and he fell down—right on top of her. Lisa struggled underneath him and tried to get him off of her. "Get _off_ of me!" she shrieked in anger and fury. Jackson pinned her legs with his, not caring about all the glass still embedded in Lisa's legs, and held her arms together above her head with one of his hands. He slapped her across the face with his other hand.

The force of the slap was so strong that her head flew sharply to the side, a pain spreading throughout her neck.

Lisa turned to look at him resentfully and spit at his face.

Jackson's right hand which was holding down her hands squeezed tightly, his nails digging into the flesh of Lisa's wrists. She yelped in pain. Jacksons' left hand came up and wiped the spit away from his face, glaring at her heavily.

"What's the matter, _Jack?_" Lisa asked, her voice taunting, her face expressing her anger and hatred for the man above her. "Didn't see that one coming?"

"You really just don't know when to give up, do you?" Jackson growled at her.

"So sorry I can't be as submissive as your other hostages. I'll keep that in mind the next time I give a care." Lisa said through gritted teeth, still wiggling her body underneath him and trying to get away.

"Why did you do that?!" demanded Jackson harshly.

"Do what?" Lisa asked, feigning innocence.

"You know what." Jackson said sneering.

Lisa glared. "I am _not_ going to be used again, Jack." She said. She then gave a cold chuckle and smirked. "You should have seen your _face_. It was _pathetic_. Tell me, Jackson, since when do you _care_ what happens to me? You wouldn't bat an eye if I had killed myself in there."

"You don't know anything." Jackson told her.

"Oh, don't I?" Lisa asked sarcastically. "Please, then, enlighten me, Jackson. What don't I know? That you're a cold-hearted mercenary without an ounce of kindness or mercy or _humanity_ in your entire body? I think I already know that."

Jackson slapped her again, and Lisa bit down hard on her cheek, drawing blood. Her eyes were getting blurry, whether from the tears that were still in her eyes or not, she wasn't sure.

"Why can't you just _give up_ already?!" shouted Jackson, frustrated.

"Why can't you?" Lisa countered. She turned to look at him once more. "Besides, if I gave in just like that, then where would the fun be?"

"You're twisted."

Lisa smirked. "I guess you're beginning to rub off on me then. Because you're the most twisted man I have ever met and will ever meet. Before you know it, you'll have rubbed off on me so much, I'll be killing people left and right, just for the fun of it."

"You don't know what you're talking about." Jackson said. "I know you enough to know that you would never do that, _ever_."

Lisa laughed humorlessly. "Please," she said, "just because I don't know every single thing about your life like you do mine, it doesn't mean that I don't know you—even if just a little bit. I think you'd be scared to see me like that. I think you'd be terrified if I became like you."

"And I think that you need to go to sleep for a little while." Jackson said, his left hand moving toward her neck.

"Don't you _dare_," Lisa growled. She brought her head up quickly and head-butted Jackson. It got the desired effect. Jackson rolled off of her, holding his head in his hands.

Lisa stumbled while getting up, and half-ran, half-limped over toward the door, unlocking it and turning the knob.

Before she could get it open, though, she was falling down flat on her face. She felt weight on her back, and realized that Jackson was on top of her, pinning her to the ground again, except she had flipped in her position. Lisa growled.

"Next time I find a gun, you had better watch yourself, Jackson."

And then her world went dark again. Really, all these forced blackouts were bound to put some trauma on her brain. And if that happened, Jackson was _so_ dead, no matter _how_ concerned or worried he looked, or how caring he seemed. Lisa vowed never again to fall for Jackson's acting just as the last stream of light filtered through her vision. Stupid charming, good-looking, convincing assassins and assassin managers.

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**Yeah, so, I'll honestly admit that I am utter rubbish at writing fight scenes, no matter what they're for--this story is no exception. I personally think that the "fight" scene(s) suck, but I hope that you don't find them horribly terrible. :( I'm trying my best here. I hope you liked this chappie. Um...I definitely think that I went OOC for either Jackson or Lisa, possibly both. I hope you don't mind, though. I AM trying to do in character to the best of my ability, but it's not entirely easy when I want to put a bunch of stuff in there that they probably wouldn't actually do or act like. **

**Please review and LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! I really want to know what you guys think of the story so far and this chapter, and if you have any guesses about what is going to happen or suggestions you wanna give, then I'd be happy to hear those as well. **

**Reviews = Love**


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